Class PS\ 

Book— f H 



THE 

MASTERY OP LANGUAGES 



OR, THE ART OF 

SPEAKING FOREIGN TONGUES 

IDIOMATICALLY. 



BY 

THOMAS * PEENDERGAST, 

FORMERLY OF HER MAJESTY'S CIVIL SERVICE AT MADRAS. 




LONDON: 

RICHARD BENTLEY, NEW BURLINGTON STREET, 

Publisher in Or dinar?/ to Her Majesty. 
1864. 




LONDON : 

PRINTED BY C. W. REYNELL, LITTLE PULTENEY STREKT, 
HAYMAEKET, W. 



CONTENTS. 



PAGK 

Preface . . . . . v 

Chapter I. — Analysis of the Process followed by Children 1 
„ II. — Outline of the Scheme . . .19 

„ III.— Memory . . . 29 

„ IV. — Evolutions of Language . . .49 

Coupled Sentences . . . *60 

„ V.— The Process . . . .69 

„ VI. — On the Selection of Sentences . . 105 

„ VII. — On Fluency and Learning by Rote . 135 

,, VIII. — Pronunciation . . . 145 

„ IX.— English . . . .157 

A List of the Commonest English "Words, 

Declinable and Indeclinable . .164 

Samples of Sentences containing from Twenty 

to Thirty of the Commonest Words . 165 
Paradigm or Synopsis, showing the Variations 
of the Commonest Declinable Words in 
the English Language . .166 

„ X.— Teloogoo . . . . 167 

Paradigm of the Commonest Inflections in 

Teloogoo . , . .184 

Teloogoo Sentences . . . *184 

„ XL — Hindustani . . . .185 

Hindustani Sentences . . .187 

Hindustani Paradigm, or Synopsis of the 
Terminations of all the Variable parts of 
Speech . . . .188 

„ XIL— On Grammar . . . 189 

„ XIII.— On Book- Work . . .217 

„ XIV. — Miscellaneous Notes, and The Labyrinth . 223 
Note . . . . . .259 



PREFACE. 



fjpHE design of this treatise is to show by an 
analysis of the child's process, — 

1. That the power of speaking foreign lan- 
guages idiomatically, may be attained with 
facility by adults without going abroad. 

2. That sentences may be so formulated, in 
all languages, that when they are thoroughly 
learned, the results evolved therefrom will in 
each new lesson double the number of idiomatic 
combinations previously acquired. 

3. That the acquisition of unconnected words 
is comparatively worthless, because they have 
not that property of expansion. 

4. That the preliminary study of grammar is 
unnecessary. 



VI 



PREFACE. 



5. That the power of speaking other tongues 
idiomatically is attained principally by efforts of 
the memory, not by logical reasonings. 

6. That the capacity of the memory for the 
retention of foreign words is universally over- 
estimated; and that every beginner ought, in 
reason, to ascertain by experiments the precise 
extent of his own individual power. 

7. That inasmuch as a word, not perfectly 
retained by the memory, cannot be correctly 
reproduced, the beginner ought to restrict him- 
self within the limit of his ascertained capacity. 

8. That he should therefore avoid seeing or 
hearing one word in excess of those which he is 
actually engaged in committing to memory. 

9. That the mere perusal of a grammar 
clogs the memory with imperfect recollections 
of words, and fractions of words ; and therefore 
it is interdicted. 

10. That, nevertheless, the beginner who 
adopts this method, will not fail to speak gram- 
matically. 

11. That the most notable characteristic of 
the child's process, is that he speaks fluently 



PREFACE. 



vii 



and idiomatically with a very small number of 
words. 

12. That the epitome of language made by 
children, all the world over, is substantially the 
same. 

13. That when a child can employ two 
hundred words of a foreign tongue, he possesses 
a practical knowledge of all the syntactical 
constructions, and of all the foreign sounds. 

14. That every foreign language should 
therefore be epitomized for a beginner, by the 
framing of a set of strictly practical sentences, 
embodying two hundred of the most useful 
words, and comprising all the most difficult 
constructions. 

15. That by "mastering" such an epitome, 
in the manner prescribed, a beginner will obtain 
the greatest possible results, with the smallest 
amount of exertion; whilst, at the same time, 
he will have abundant leisure to bestow upon 
the pronunciation that prominent attention to 
which it is entitled. 

The theory on which the scheme is based is 



vm 



PREFACE. 



that whatever we undertake to learn, should 
be learned thoroughly ; that no exertion is called 
forth in reproducing what has been so acquired ; 
that if it be repeated daily it cannot be for- 
gotten ; that long sentences are more useful 
than short ones, because many of the lesser 
are contained in the greater, and are deducible 
from them by subdivision; that the treachery 
of the memory may be effectually neutralized, 
by always hearing or seeing the lesson afresh, 
before any effort is made to reproduce it ; that 
the action of the memory is more vigorous in 
frequent short efforts, than in continuous appli- 
cation ; that the formation of habit coincides 
with that principle; and that a pursuit, which 
is not beyond the capacity of very young 
children, ought not to be conducted as if it were 
a severe intellectual undertaking. 

In theory, some of these propositions are 
admitted, but in practice the first lessons 
are not thoroughly acquired ; they are not 
thoroughly amalgamated; the memory is over- 
loaded ; and the sentences are too short, and 
too much limited by technical considerations. 



PREFACE. 



ix 



A remedy for this want of thoroughness 
can only be found in the establishment of 
some test which can neither be impugned 
nor evaded ; for a standard which is not 
stringently applied, is a mere delusion. We 
ought to avail ourselves of all those compensa- 
tions which nature has provided for the feeble- 
ness of the intellectual powers during childhood. 
That perfect " mastery " over their vernacular 
tongue which children display, as they advance 
step by step, must be relentlessly exacted in 
relation to each foreign sentence committed to 
memory, and to each branch into which the 
beginner may think fit to divide his operations. 

This method is specially designed to meet 
the wants of adults, and to foster the inva- 
luable process of self-instruction. It combines 
" unity with progress." As it only professes 
to be an exposition of phenomena which have 
come under everyone's observation, the want 
of novelty may not be considered altogether 
unpardonable. There may not be one idea 
which has not been forestalled by the thousands 
of able men who have given their lives to the 



X 



PREFACE. 



study of the art of learning languages. But as 
there has been no clear enunciation of the 
universality and energy of that principle which 
is traceable in the operations of every one 
who has attained colloquial success, whether 
with or without methodical procedure, this 
work is not altogether unnecessary. 

Sages are constantly remarking that there 
is no royal road to learning. But the iron 
rail is a right royal improvement on the high- 
ways of our forefathers ; and the ocean steamer 
surpasses all their conceptions of the per- 
fectibility of navigation. Our communications 
with foreign nations have attained an astonishing 
development ; but no parallel facilitation of the 
intercourse between man and man has been 
effected, although its importance in relation to 
all that concerns the best and highest interests 
of our race, is incalculable. 

Complicated and erudite schemes are gene- 
rally received with approbation; but it is hard 
to persuade men to condescend to a simpli- 
fication of the process followed by child- 
ren. Nevertheless, the searcher for truth 



PREFACE. 



xi 



will doubtless extend his indulgence to this 
attempt to decipher a neglected page in the 
book of nature. The crude suggestions here 
put forth may perhaps fall into the hands of 
practical men, who will apply them to the 
formation of a sound system for promoting 
an elegant accomplishment ; for securing eco- 
nomy of time and labour; for enabling any 
individual residing abroad to disseminate a 
knowledge of his own language ; and for quali- 
fying many to go forth into all lands, and 
preach the Gospel of Peace. 



August 1864. 



CHAPTER L 

♦ 



ANALYSIS OF THE PROCESS FOLLOWED BY 
CHILDREN. 

rFHERE are certain maxims which have exer- 
cised a most pernicious influence in deterring 
people from the study of languages, and from the 
investigations requisite to lead to the discovery of 
the proper method of acquiring them. 

It is currently believed, on the authority of 
great names, that the aptitude which we display 
in childhood is lost by degrees as we grow to 
maturity ; and that there is a special faculty which 
characterizes the linguist, without which no great 
or rapid progress can reasonably be expected. 

But we have no proof that any of our powers 
begin to decay in early life, nor are we in pos- 
session of any analysis of the infantile process, 
complete enough to enable us 'to determine by 
what method, or by what concurrence of accidents, 

B 



2 



ANALYSIS OF THE PROCESS 



it happens that every child acquires an idio- 
matic power over the language of those among 
whom his lot may be cast. We may, therefore, 
repudiate those maxims, and thus get rid of the 
two chief obstacles which we encounter on the 
threshold. 

In other pursuits we work upon certain intel- 
ligible principles, and Ave gradually obtain definite 
results, commensurate with our efforts ; but no true 
mode of action has been laid down, whereby an edu- 
cated man, even when residing abroad, can reason- 
ably expect to accpiire a free colloquial use of a 
foreign language, without going through a course of 
study, which ■ is always either tedious or laborious, 
and which, in many instances, proves unavailing. 

The scholar fails in spite of the advantages 
he possesses in having access to the accumulated 
learning, and the combined experience and skill of 
all Christendom. And yet every one of his chil- 
dren, unless subjected to counteracting influences, 
accomplishes the task without books, without study, 
and without instruction. This is a mystery which 
he does not even attempt to solve, because he 
believes that the child has one more faculty than 
is possessed by the man. 

But uneducated men often learn to speak 
foreign tongues in a few weeks, without any of 
the appliances of science. In such persons it is 
obvious that the aptitude has extended beyond the 



FOLLOWED BY CHILDREN, 



3 



period of childhood : but then they are declared to 
be endowed with that special faculty, which, 
though it does not indicate any intellectual supe- 
riority, is not enjoyed by ordinary mortals. Thus 
the question is universally evaded and shelved. 

It is a very unpalatable fact that people of 
the slenderest capacity are found to surpass men 
of brilliant talents in this pursuit, but the only 
safe conclusion that can be drawn, is that the 
latter have worked on erroneous principles, and 
have widely deviated from the true course. 

The object of this work is to show that, in 
the infantile process, there lies latent a method 
absolutely perfect, which is within the compass 
of the feeblest intellect, but the principle of which 
has never been satisfactorily expounded. 

The late Cardinal Mezzofanti, indisputably the 
greatest linguist that ever lived, has passed away 
from among us, leaving his plan of learning lan- 
guages unrevealed. But there is good reason to 
doubt whether he had any fixed principle of action, 
because none of his admirers could ever discover 
one, and there was great inequality in the results 
of his various efforts. His biographer relates that 
he possessed a retentive memory, a quick ear, and 
an incredible flexibility of the organs of speech. 
He constantly filled his head with new words ; he 
learned every new grammar, and applied himself 
to every strange dictionary, but he vaguely 



4 



ANALYSIS OF THE PROCESS 



described his talent as a " mere physical endow- 
ment, a thing of instinct, almost of routine." 

Some think that he was too vain of his pre- 
eminence to divulge his secret, and others that he 
had none to reveal. At all events, his labours 
have been fruitless; and we have obtained no 
useful suggestions either from him, or from any 
other great linguist, to indicate the true method 
of beginning to learn foreign tongues. On the 
other hand, there appears to be nothing, either 
in their practice or in their writings, to contro- 
vert the notion that any person who adopts the 
principle of the method employed by children, 
may learn to speak a foreign tongue more expedi- 
tiously and more idiomatically than many linguists 
who commence their operations by learning gram- 
mar, and studying the best authors, according to 
the methods generally prevailing. 

A child, living in daily association with foreign- 
ers, acquires two or three languages at once, and 
speaks them all fluently, idiomatically, and without 
intermixture. He learns them, not unconsciously 
nor without effort, but without tuition, without 
one idea of the nature of the science of grammar, 
and without any philosophical reasoning. This is 
a feat which baffles the efforts of men of the highest 
endowments, and of the best education. 

If it be true that a great increase of power 
results from the development of our faculties by 



FOLLOWED BY CHILDREN. 



5 



education, whence arises the supposed inability of 
adults to compete with children in respect to the 
employment of idiomatic forms of speech ? There 
is one very obvious reason which outweighs every- 
thing that can be put into the balance against it. 
It is because we do not pursue the same course 
that they do. Let us, therefore, track them closely ; 
for if we tread in their footsteps, we must be in 
the right path, and the result will show that we 
have not lost the aptitude of childhood. 

Many conflicting and unsatisfactory reasons are 
assigned for the wonderful success of children, viz., 
their greater power of concentrating their attention ; 
their freedom from care, from prejudice, and from 
distraction ; their elasticity of. mind ; the flexibility 
of their vocal organs ; their greater quickness and 
retentiveness of memory; the non-development of 
those powers of discrimination and of comparison 
which adults exercise to their own disadvantage ; 
their greater need impelling them to greater exer- 
tions; their constantly hearing a language spoken, 
and thus learning by the aid of an ear uncorrupted ; 
their greater delicacy of ear; their greater impres- 
sibility ; and, finally, their having a brain unoccu- 
pied, and thus better adapted for the reception of 
new words and ideas, like a sheet of paper, whereon 
what is first written, although covered by innumer- 
able new scribblings from day to day, is boldly 
asserted to be ineffaceable and indestructible. 



6 



ANALYSIS OF THE PROCESS 



As children talk long before they are able to 
reason about words, some hold that the gift of 
speech is altogether independent of the intellec- 
tual faculties, and that it is merely the result of a 
physiological function. Many contend that there 
can be no method in the process, because none is 
discernible. No doubt, the operations of infants, 
individually considered, arc perplexingly unscien- 
tific and inconsistent, and to all appearance destitute 
of any indication of an orderly or systematic pro- 
cedure. But when we reflect that, for six thousand 
years, myriads of successful experiments have been 
carried on unceasingly by children, in every region 
of the earth, — and that, in spite of their inexpe- 
rience, their intellectual weakness, and the total 
want of concert among them, instances of failure 
are almost unknown, — we are driven irresistibly to 
the conclusion that there must be some method in 
operation ; and it is time that that method should 
be investigated and explained. 

As we have already found one good and suffi- 
cient cause why we fail in competing with children, 
it is needless to examine all those suggestions 
which have been devised to vindicate the theory of 
our inferiority to our former selves. Instead of 
this, let us try to collate all the facts that we can 
find, connected with the infantile mode of proce- 
dure, in order to ascertain how they harmonize 
with each other, and to resolve them into a 



FOLLOWED BY CHILDREN. 



7 



practical system, which shall be consistent with 
reason and general experience. 

Being endowed with great sagacity in inter- 
preting looks, tones, and gestures, infants begin to 
understand what is addressed to them long before 
they know the meaning of the individual words, 
and they receive credit for knowing all that they 
seem to understand. The wonder is that they 
understand at the same time so much language, 
and so few words. 

But we are not envious of their power of 
understanding what they hear, because we are not 
inferior to them in that respect. It is in speaking 
idiomatically that adults generally fail, and child- 
ren always succeed. In this respect alone they 
excel us, and this is the object of our inquiry. 

It is useless to attempt to analyse mental 
processes, or to divide the words which a child 
understands and recollects, more or less perfectly, 
into various classes, according to the degrees in 
which they are severally known to him. But there 
is a classification on a simple plan, which is 
eminently precise. It divides words into the 
known and the unknown, or those learned per- 
fectly, and those learned imperfectly. 

In order to determine with precision how many 
and what words they know, we must observe those 
combinations which they employ without being 
prompted or assisted. Up to this stage they have 



8 



ANALYSIS OF THE PROCESS 



been led and guided by their mothers and nurses, 
from whom they have learned the utterance of 
words, and in whose hands they have been passive in- 
struments ; but now they begin to teach themselves 
by imitating and repeating complete sentences. 
This is the true commencement of that indepen- 
dent process of self-instruction which we have to 
investigate, to methodize, and to adopt. 

As words are not language, except when they 
are united in idiomatic combinations, we class 
among the unknown all those which they employ 
unconnectedly. On the other hand, by analysing 
their sentences, we discover the number of words 
really and practically known to them; and the 
result proves how very small a number suffices to 
produce that astonishing variety of expression 
which loquacious children display. 

Their eagerness in learning to talk, and the per- 
severance and earnestness with which they apply 
themselves to the reiteration of any form of speech 
which pleases their fancy, are the sources of their 
success in pronouncing and in reproducing whole 
sentences. They show their intelligent appreciation 
of these, by gradually interweaving with them the 
single words which they have previously learned. 
As they advance, they employ sentences in which 
will be found many words which they do not 
thoroughly understand, and some common phrases, 
the precise meaning of which they do not, and 



FOLLOWED BY CHILDREN. 



9 



need not, and perhaps never will comprehend, 
because they puzzle the grammarian himself. 
Nevertheless as we are now treating solely of 
their power of speaking in sentences, we class 
among the words which children know, every one 
of those which they use correctly in combination. 

Over these they have acquired, by their own 
exertions, the right of possession and the power of 
ownership. These, as the word " vernacular" sug- 
gests, are the little home-bred slaves that come and 
go at their bidding, and over which they exercise 
absolute mastery and control, when they use the 
gift of speech. 

Their imitative faculty is always in active 
operation, prompting them to echo and re-echo 
what they hear; but more especially those truly 
practical sentences, by means of which they obtain 
the gratification of their desires. And because the 
latter are very numerous, and are continually 
recurring, the sentences which relate to them are 
reiterated so often, that they gradually become 
domiciled in the memory, and in course of time 
they seem to issue spontaneously from the lips, as 
if they were the natural expression of those desires. 
But in reality they are called forth by repeated 
efforts of memory, which, by the agency of habit, 
become slighter and slighter, till at last they are 
quite inappreciable. But habit is second nature, 
and that which is the result of confirmed habit 



10 



ANALYSIS OF THE PROCESS 



becomes so easy, that it is to all appearance in- 
voluntary, and, in common parlance, is said to be 
natural. 

As the stock of sentences which they learn de- 
pends mainly on the chance utterances of others ; 
as they are often checked and interrupted, when 
they ought to be aided and encouraged in their 
persevering, but tiresome reiteration of a new 
sentence ; and as they are wayward and capricious 
in bestowing their attention ; it often happens that 
clever children are slow, while stupid ones are 
comparatively quick in learning to talk. It 
will be shown hereafter that their progress in 
speaking is regulated by the practical utility of 
those sentences which they acquire, and by their 
assiduity in employing them, with other words 
interchanged. 

Amongst all their mistakes and deficiencies, it 
must be borne in mind that they are sadly puzzled 
by hearing many sentences that are too long to 
be remembered, many that are unintelligible, and 
many that are unsuitable to be repeated, word 
for word, to express their own thoughts and 
wishes. 

But their individual imperfections do not 
impeach the perfection, or the validity of the 
system of nature which they unconsciously adopt. 
That system must be judged of by its results in 
in the aggregate, not by the isolated operations of 



FOLLOWED BY CHILDREN. 



11 



individuals, who pick up a language in a course of 
careless desultory gleaning. 

When children undertake to compose a sentence 
which they have never heard uttered by others, or 
not often enough to enable them to retain it 
thoroughly in the memory, they speak with inde- 
cision and inaccuracy. But when they utter 
complete idiomatical sentences with fluency, with 
accurate pronunciation, and with decision, while 
they are still incapable of understanding any of the 
principles according to which they unconsciously 
combine their words in grammatical form, it is 
obvious that they must have learned, retained, 
and reproduced them by dint of imitation and 
reiteration. 

These sentences are the rails on which the 
trains of thought travel swiftly, smoothly, and 
without the slightest deviation from their proper 
course; and each language seems to constitute a 
separate line of rails, because they do not clash 
with each other when the little linguists have 
occasion to converse with two or more foreigners of 
different nations. The reason of this appears to 
be that, in the first instance, the words are 
indissolubly bound together in those sentences 
which the child learns by rote, that is by imita- 
tion, and repetition of the sounds, but not 
without a definite idea of their combined meaning. 
By slow and almost imperceptible degrees he 



12 



ANALYSIS OF THE PROCESS 



begins to frame variations of the sentences, by 
interchanging the words or the clauses, and by 
inserting new words, as humour, or chance, or 
necessity impel him ; but still their first connec- 
tion with each other is preserved unbroken in 
the memory by the frequent repetition of the 
originals. 

Each new sentence which he acquires is inter- 
changeable, more or less usefully, with those pre- 
viously learned by rote; and as it generally contains 
one or two words already familiar to him, an easy 
and natural connection springs up among them; 
they daily become more closely amalgamated with 
each other in the memory, and at the same time 
more clearly and thoroughly understood. 

In learning to talk he gains the greatest 
advantage from consorting with other children, 
because their speech is limited to a very few words, 
which are constantly reiterated with variations, 
and he echoes what they say more easily, and 
adopts their phrases more readily, than the less 
congenial and less suitable expressions of adults. 

Long before their reasoning powers become 
capable of grappling with grammar, children display 
fluency, correctness, and copiousness of speech ; 
fluency, because the sentences which they know 
are so few that the memory is not overloaded, and 
they can reproduce them with ease; correctness, 
because their words are linked together in the 



FOLLOWED BY CHILDREN. 



13 



memory in the form of idiomatic sentences, learned 
by rote; and copiousness, because there is in well- 
selected practical sentences a reproductive energy 
which disunited words do not possess. 

Hereafter we shall observe how it is that the 
knowledge of many words is not essential, and that 
fluency, correctness, and copiousness are quite con- 
sistent with a very small vocabulary. 

Infants learn their own language slowly but 
surely, for a speechless child is very rarely to be met 
with ; and their progress does not depend upon the 
intelligence of their parents, for a silly mother who 
incessantly repeats the same colloquial tales, brings 
an only child forward in speaking, more quickly 
than the cleverest woman, who does not recite 
dialogues, and resort to repetitions. 

The infantile method is also perfect, inasmuch 
as children always learn to speak exactly in accord- 
ance with the exemplars around them, however 
pure, or however corrupt those may be. The 
best proof of this perfection in their imitative 
power, is to be found in the fact . that there 
are some languages which have been transmitted, 
almost without alteration, through many genera- 
tions. 

The memory of children is not so retentive as 
that of adults, for we know that, if removed, when 
under four years of age, to a place where they 
neither speak it nor hear it spoken, they lose every 



14 



ANALYSTS OF THE PROCESS 



word of their own language in a few months. On 
the other hand, if they speak it but for a very 
few minutes every day, they never forget it. 
They learn a new language equally well in either 

case. 

Hence it appears that repetition, which we have 
shown to be the process by which they originally 
acquire the power of using idiomatic sentences, is 
also the preserving principle by means of which 
children retain that power. By transposing and 
interchanging the words and the clauses, they 
utilize them all, and thus gradually, but uncon- 
sciously, amplify their power of speech. They 
pronounce to perfection by closely observing and 
mimicking, or even caricaturing, the pitch of 
the voice, the tones, the gesticulations, the move- 
ments of the head, and the contortions of the face 
of those around them. 

The whole process, therefore, resolves itself into 
imitation, repetition, and diligent endeavours to 
give expression to new ideas, by changing the 
words from one sentence to another. 

It is obvious that a very moderate amount of 
reasoning power is exercised in this process. 
Infants do not possess an intuitive understanding 
of any language; nor have they the power of 
framing idiomatic sentences at once by instinct. 
Not until they have made many futile attempts, 
can they utter the simple vowel sounds ; not until 



FOLLOWED BY CHILDREN. 



15 



many weeks or months have elapsed can they 
pronounce words ; and after that there is a long 
interval before they can string words together in 
sentences. And yet the feeble efforts of dawning 
reason are amply sufficient for the colloquial attain- 
ment of the most complicated languages. 

Thus far we have traced the progress of infants 
in beginning to speak their mother tongue. This 
natural impulse continues in full vigour during 
childhood and youth. Still guided by the same 
unerring instinct, a child of six, eight, or ten 
years of age, when suddenly transplanted to a 
foreign country, where he consorts chiefly with the 
natives, immediately adopts the same course of 
imitation and repetition of practical sentences. 
As he is alike untrammelled and unaided, the true 
process of nature is most distinctly and perfectly 
exemplified by him. In three or four months he 
generally talks a foreign language as fluently as his 
own. If he never hears it spoken, except by the 
natives of the country, he speaks it without any 
adulteration; but if there are people around him 
who jumble together the words, or the tones, or 
the constructions of two languages, he always 
adopts their jargon. His conversation is com- 
pounded of the phraseology of all those with whom 
he is brought into casual intercourse, for he imitates 
everything and everybody without discrimination. 
He never pauses to consider which language he 



16 



ANALYSIS OF THE PROCESS 



has to speak, nor does he ever address the wrong 
language to anyone. 

This promptitude, when displayed by adults, 
is generally regarded as an indication of great 
cleverness, although every child exhibits it, even 
in speaking four or five languages. 

It is by this clearly traceable course of action 
that the urchin masters every new language that 
he hears ; and therefore we shall take him for our 
model, instead of the helpless, dependent infant. 
Without analyzing or philosophising, and with- 
out any of those advantages which science and 
experience are supposed to confer upon adults, he 
contrives to speak foreign tongues more idiomati- 
cally, and with greater facility than they do. 
And it is worthy of notice that all languages 
appear to be equally easy to him, although he has 
to contend, exactly as we have, against a fixed 
habit of expressing his thoughts, in a language 
which is dissimilar, perhaps, in every respect. 

Children are considered by some to have an 
advantage over adults, in consequence of their 
minds being blank ; but ours are blank enough 
with respect to a language altogether unknown to 
us, and vacuity of mind is not found to be con- 
ducive to success in any other pursuit. 

In truth, children labour under several disad- 
vantages, for which, however, nature provides 
adequate compensation. For instance, they have 



FOLLOWED BY CHILDREN. 



17 



less power of concentration, less application, and 
abstraction, and no idea of method. And although 
in early life the memory is more sprightly, it is a 
mistake to suppose that adults cannot equal the 
actual performances of children, in learning a 
number of words in any foreign language. 

Again, children far excel adults in the true 
imitation of foreign sounds. That power is due to 
a flexibility of the vocal organs, which becomes 
impaired by disuse and neglect. However when 
the cause is ascertained and the remedy is ob- 
vious, the failure may be rectified for the future. 
We have all been in possession of that power 
of imitation, and our apparent inferiority, which 
arises solely from the omission to exercise the 
organs, is only accidental. 

Hereafter this may be easily tested with chil- 
dren placed in positions favourable to their keeping 
up, uninterruptedly, the practice of speaking new 
languages. It seems probable that, under such 
circumstances, their power of imitation would not 
only be developed to an unparalleled extent, but 
that it would also last in full force as long as the 
other faculties of the body and mind remained 
unimpaired. 

But we must bear in mind that the faculty 
of reproducing sounds has nothing intellectual in 
it. The power of expressing thought in idiomatic 
phraseology is the most important matter for 



18 



ANALYSIS OF THE PROCESS, ETC* 



consideration, because this is the essentially intel- 
lectual part of the undertaking. 

The success of children is due to their following 
the "light of nature. We have ignored that beacon, 
and have deviated from the right course; but 
when we obtain the true bearings and soundings, 
there is nothing to prevent us from resuming it, 
with every confidence of success. 



CHAPTER II. 



OUTLINE OF THE SCHEME. 

LANGUAGE is a tree which is propagated not 
by seeds, but by cuttings ; not by words, but 
by sentences. 

Every language is an aggregate of sentences, 
that is, of words combined in certain established 
forms, grammatical and idiomatic. Unconnected 
words are not language ; and therefore we proscribe 
them altogether. Sentences have within them a 
principle of vitality, an inherent power of ex= 
pressing many different ideas by giving birth to 
new sentences. Unconnected words have no such 
power, and therefore it is a misapplication of time 
and labour to learn them at the outset. 

A sentence is a branch with every leaf arranged 
in the perfect order of nature. A branch may be 
used for purposes of decoration, or it may be car- 
ried as a flag of truce between warring tribes. 



20 



OUTLINE OF THE SCHEME, 



But disunited words are of no more use to a learner, 
than a sack of loose leaves would be to the deco- 
rator, or to the herald of peace. 

Our taskmasters make us waste weeks and 
months in exercises which virtually amount to endea- 
vours to manufacture branches of leaves without 
sticks. For when the coherence of the words, their 
combined significance, and their order of arrangement 
have been lost ; when the words are bisected and 
trisected, and their component parts are scattered, 
we cannot re-arrange them in the original idiomatic 
order, and it is laborious even to combine them 
grammatically. Every word, in its turn, gives 
rise to much deliberation ; and the result, after all, 
is generally a gross caricature, exhibiting the vine 
leaves of Spain, France, or Italy, grotesquely 
arranged upon a stick of British oak. 

There is no reason why a beginner should not 
learn complete sentences of ten or twenty words 
each, in a foreign language, one by one, and em- 
ploy them as freely and intelligently as if he were 
speaking his vernacular tongue. And considering 
that the classical proportions of a sentence are not 
impaired by the removal of any one word, and 
the substitution of another grammatically corre- 
sponding to it, there is nothing to prevent a begin- 
ner from acquiring all the variations which may 
be producible by interchanging words in strict 
conformity with the established construction. 



OUTLINE OF THE SCHEME. 



21 



But this restrictive course is not followed. 
It is true that dialogue books are used, but so 
many sentences are studied at once that the idiom- 
atic combinations escape from the memory, although 
the individual words may be all retained. More- 
over, the study of grammar is generally super- 
added, and thus the memory is overtasked. The 
sentences, too, are sometimes very injudiciously 
selected, and conversations are attempted in which 
they cannot be introduced without considerable 
exercise of ingenuity on the one hand, or the 
employment of unknown words on the other. It 
is thus that the difficulties of a beginner are 

seriouslv increased. 
«/ 

Yet in spite of all the modern improvements in 
the methods of learning languages, there are many 
well educated men who still persist in following the 
ancient system. After striving conscientiously for 
months to learn a living language from books, 
they give it up in despair, finding that they make 
no perceptible progress, even although they hear it 
constantly spoken around them. This is the natu- 
ral consequence of following an irrational method. 
Men study grammar, and learn thereby to inter- 
pret the written language, when their object is to 
acquire the habit of speaking it. They are always 
engaged in decomposing, instead of composing. 
They assume that because they can disintegrate, 
they can also reconstruct sentences; and they 



22 



OUTLINE OF THE SCHEME. 



cannot discern that there is anything obstructive 
in the method which they are pursuing. 

Instead of receiving, as children do, the inimi- 
table fabric of speech ready made, they supply 
themselves with the raw material in profusion, in 
the vain hope of manufacturing it for themselves, at 
some future, and perhaps distant period, by means 
of cumbrous and costly machinery. 

Relying on the traditions of their boyhood, they 
overload the memory with words, without making 
any attempt to ascertain its capacity for retaining 
them, and regardless of the necessity for repro- 
ducing them in their proper combinations. They 
flatter themselves that every word which they 
have seen and heard can be reproduced at plea- 
sure. They learn a number of miscellaneous 
words very imperfectly, and without scrutiny as to 
their practical utility ; and they delude themselves 
with the idea that they know them, because with 
the aid of the dictionary and of the context, they 
can interpret the sentences in which they stand. 
They regard the power of recognition as equivalent 
to the cognition of words. Yet they scoff at a 
man who pretends to know everybody whom he 
knows by sight. 

Although they seldom attempt to combine 
words, they are content to ascribe their inability to 
do so to the absence of the special talent required 
for that purpose, or else they lay the blame on their 



OUTLINE OF THE SCHEME. 



23 



ears. They employ the words, language, grammar, 
knowing, studying, speaking, talking and learning, 
in a vague indeterminate manner. They retard 
their own progress by injudiciously mingling incon- 
gruous parts of the process, by putting the first 
last, and the last first; and they sometimes alto- 
gether omit the most essential part. 

In defiance of all experience, there are many 
who still hold that a good scientific acquaintance 
with a grammar, is practically equivalent to a 
knowledge of the language to which it relates. 
Now, any child who associates with foreign children, 
contrives, unless there be some disturbing causes, 
to speak their language in a few weeks, and he 
effects it without learning any grammar ; and yet 
there is no magic in it. By those who have never 
given a thought to the subject, he is oracularly 
declared to learn by ear. But he is not merely 
a passive listener; his power of speech is the 
result of untiring, vigorous action ; that is, of the 
assiduous exercise of the memory, of the imitative 
faculty, and of the vocal organs, in recalling and 
repeating some practical sentences, which, by 
chance, he has heard others use. His success 
does not depend either on the quality of his hearing 
apparatus, or of his understanding, for he inva- 
riably succeeds. 

The child practises oral composition on a very 
small scale, but on a progressive plan, extremely 



24 



OUTLINE OF THE SCHEME. 



simple and effective, which adults witness every 
day, though without discerning that it is based 
on a principle which is the essence of the lin- 
guistic art. 

When, in opposition to that principle, the 
achievement of fluently connecting foreign words 
in appropriate and idiomatic combinations, 
is presumed to be attainable by grammar and 
analysis, that is, by means of theory, without 
practice, — the result always is, and always must 
be, failure. 

Now in order to acquire the colloquial use of a 
language as expeditiously, as easily, and as effec- 
tually as children do, we have to deduce from their 
desultory, irregular operations, an orderly method, 
by which time and labour may be strictly econo- 
mised, and by which definite daily progress may 
be secured. The leading principle is, to learn a 
very little at a time ; not in a loose, careless 
way, but perfectly. Some words must be selected 
to be learned first; and it is essential that their 
number should be so limited that they can all 
be reproduced instantaneously, without an effort. 
They should also be committed to memory, ar- 
ranged in idiomatic combinations, that is, in ready- 
made sentences. These ought to be of a strictly 
practical nature, and they ought to be framed so 
as to include, in a small compass, all the construc- 
tions of the language. 



OUTLINE OF THE SCHEME. 



25 



The adult beginner must not attempt to learn 
more than one sentence at a time. 

He must receive the pronunciation of each 
sentence from a native, echoing it until he can 
utter the whole combination of sounds intelligibly, 
and with facility, and he must practise until he 
can interchange the words of the first two sen- 
tences into every possible variation, as freely as 
if they belonged to his own language. If he 
will thus "master" each sentence, and if he 
will examine himself honestly, and without any 
self-deception, before he begins to learn a new 
one, his daily progress, whether fast or slow, will 
be definite. 

Let it be clearly understood that the most 
fatal of all errors is the overloading of the 
memory. 

The beginner must not learn any unconnected 
words, nor look into a book, until he has gene 
through a certain course of training. If he does 
not attend to these restrictions, the memory will 
become clogged with imperfectly remembered 
words, and will be unable to effect those rapid 
movements which are essential to the attainment 
of perfect fluency. 

This is the only certain test, whereby it can be 
discovered how many words he has " mastered." 

The sentences which he commits to memory 
form the basis of his first oral exercises, and 



26 



OUTLINE OF THE SCHEME. 



afterwards they become the models for his future 
guidance in composing new ones. 

By concentrating his attention upon them, 
instead of exercising it discursively upon a larger 
range, he acquires an idiomatic command of 
language on a small scale. 

If properly selected, a few sentences will 
afford him an incredible variety of expression, 
and he will not fail to speak grammatically, 
because, if he complies with the stipulations and 
restrictions, he cannot deviate from the true 
constructions except through gross inattention to 
the models. 

In selecting what he is to commit to memory, he 
must subject each sentence and each word to the 
standard of practical utility, discarding all words 
which are not used every day, and substituting 
those which are more frequently employed; for 
if useless words be enlisted, they occupy time, 
and attention, and a place in his memory, which 
cannot be spared without detriment to his pro- 
gress. 

They who make a levy of words in mass, and 
expect to find their raw recruits as useful as 
disciplined soldiers, invariably discover, when they 
take the field, that the greater their number, the 
more unmanageable they are; and that when an 
attempt is made to manoeuvre them, the result is a 
miserable state of confusion. 



OUTLINE OF THE SCHEME. 



27 



On the other hand, a highly disciplined 
phalanx of two or three hundred useful words, 
arranged in well-chosen sentences, comprising 
every construction of the language, and under 
the perfect control of a faithful memory, will 
be of far greater service to a traveller, than two 
or three thousand words, untrained to active 
co-operation. 



CHAPTER III, 



MEMORY. 

HP HE source of all our blundering over foreign 
~* languages is the mistaken notion that the 
attainment of the colloquial power depends more 
upon reasoning processes, than upon efforts of the 
memory. That pursuit cannot be a very intel- 
lectual one, in which people of the humblest 
capacity succeed. 

Children learn their first sentences without 
reasoning about the words. They know what 
meaning the whole sentence conveys, but they do 
not understand each particular word, nor do they 
know one part of speech from another. 

They repeat some sounds which they have 
heard others employing with success ; and whenever 
that repetition is a true imitation, the result is an 
idiomatic sentence. 

The memory is generally regarded as a 



so 



MEMORY, 



repertory, in which all new ideas are sorted and 
arranged, in an orderly manner, amongst our 
previous experiences, so that they shall always be 
forthcoming when wanted. Such is the theory, 
but the practice very seldom corresponds to it; 
and yet we find in some people a strong conviction 
that everything received is permanently, though 
indistinctly retained. Hence the practice of 
attempting to learn, in one sitting, a number of 
foreign words, with their strange sounds and their 
multiform variations, far in excess of the power of 
the memory. These, however, demand for their 
retention and reproduction, a tenacity and a 
vivacity which stand in strong contrast with the 
lethargy of the overcrammed memory. The mode 
of action of this faculty, in the acquisition of 
languages, is peculiar, and it deserves considera- 
tion. The duration of any impression made upon 
the memory is uncertain, varying in proportion to 
the interest excited within us; to the attention 
that we bestow ; to the time that it remains in 
undisturbed predominance ; or to the frequency of 
its renewal. 

Our power of recollecting sentiments or inci- 
dents is intellectual, because we interweave them 
amongst our experiences, and then we are able, by 
the association of ideas, to retrace, recall, and con- 
template them. In this manner anything, though 
not everything, may be retained. 



MEMORY. 



31 



But foreign words, being merely strange sounds, 
without any natural or obvious significance, cannot 
be retraced and recalled by efforts of the intellect, 
because they are not associated in the memory with 
any of our feelings, habits, or ideas, and we cannot 
reproduce them by conjuring up other times, scenes, 
persons, or events. The impressions we receive 
from them are not durable, and they can only be 
made so by being frequently renewed. 

The difficulty of accurately reproducing them is 
proportionate to the number of sounds, that is, 
of syllables, which we attempt to learn at one 
eifort. In this respect, the retentive power of the 
memory, so far from being unlimited, is feeble in 
the extreme. The mere utterance of a sentence of 
a dozen syllables, of a strange language, when 
heard for the first time, is difficult ; but the reten- 
tion thereof demands a succession of efforts of the 
memory, and of the imitative power. 

Unintermitting repetition of a few sounds will 
undoubtedly preserve them in the memory, and 
children resort to this expedient, as if apprehensive 
that they are never to hear the same combination 
again. Adults may follow the same plan; but such 
drudgery is unnecessary, because we may cause 
the sounds to be repeated to us for our imitation, 
at intervals, as often as we please, and thus learn 
them with little trouble and no fatigue to the 
memory. Whatever course we pursue, the sounds 



32 



MEMORY. 



of strange words, as soon as the attention is with- 
drawn from them, begin to evaporate from the 
memory, like raindrops exposed to the action of the 
sun and wind; and as every minute that passes, 
without an attempt to renew them, shortens the 
period of their duration, and renders them less and 
less perfect, it is worse than useless to tax the 
memory to recall them, thus deteriorated by the 
action of time, and the intrusion of other impres- 
sions. It is far better to have a native always at 
command during the first few days, to utter them 
afresh for our imitation, at intervals snatched from 
other pursuits. Supposing a certain uniform degree 
of attention to be given, the more frequently we 
practise such repetitions at short intervals, and the 
more carefully we imitate the sounds, the more 
lasting and the more accurate will be the impres- 
sions produced on the memory. 

This is the true course ; and it is impossible to 
learn the sounds of foreign words to perfection on 
any other principle. Each sentence ought to be 
thus practised until by mimicry we can echo the 
sounds with success. Repetition trains the vocal 
organs to utter them with ease, while it also fixes 
them in the memory, so that by degrees we can 
pronounce them accurately without the native's 
aid. 

The lapse of three hours devoted to other 
occupations will often undo a morning's work 



MEMORY. 



33 



to a serious extent, and a pause of six hours will 
obliterate some of the sounds from the memory 
altogether. On this account the intervals between 
the repetitions ought to be brief. But during the 
hours of sleep, when the faculties are in a state of 
repose, we lose nothing ; because the latest impres- 
sions remain undisturbed, the action of other 
thoughts is suspended, and the flight of time seems 
to be arrested. For if we charge the memory 
shortly before we fall asleep, and revert to the task 
as soon as we awake, the impressions are as fresh, 
after eight hours' rest, as if only half an hour had 
elapsed since the words were learned by heart. 
But in dreams the memory is often very busy, and 
therefore it is only in deep, dreamless sleep that 
the activity of the brain is totally suspended. 

Thus far in respect to words, regarded as mere 
sounds. We have now to deal with them as 
representative signs, and to consider how we may 
best contrive to establish so complete an amalga- 
mation of the sound with the thing signified, that 
the words will come spontaneously to the lips when 
we want to give utterance to the ideas which they 
convey. Here, again, let us observe the course of 
nature, indicated in the restrictive and reiterative 
method adopted by children. They maintain their 
acquisitions by repeating, at short intervals, all the 
sentences they have learned; and they gradually 

D 



34 



MEMORY. 



enlarge their narrow sphere of conversation by 
interchanges and transpositions of words. 

It is not by reasoning, nor by deliberation that 
they compose idiomatic sentences. 

They do not translate. In their commerce 
with foreigners they do not barter word for word. 
They do not export a form of speech, an idea 
clothed in language, to be exchanged for one 
exactly corresponding to it; but they import an 
idiomatic combination of words, together with the 
idea belonging to it ; they immediately begin to 
employ it for practical purposes without alteration ; 
and they repeat it so often that it becomes stereo- 
typed in the memory. 

The words of a foreign tongue which we com- 
mit to memory are prisoners of war, incessantly 
trying to escape, and it requires great vigilance to 
detain them ; for unless our attention be conti- 
nually directed towards them, and unless we 
muster them frequently, they steal away into the 
forest, and disperse. But when they are bound 
together in sentences, the same degree of watch- 
fulness is not required, because they escape with 
difficulty, and a whole gang of them may easily be 
traced and recaptured at once. 

When a word has escaped from the memory we 
often find that no intellectual exertion can recal it. 
But the lost word, when not wanted, will some- 
times return unbidden, without any assignable 



MEMORY. 



35 



cause, or any traceable connection of thought. 
Our inability to command the use of it in the 
moment of need, arises solely from the want of 
habituation. 

The more we familiarize ourselves with a 
newly acquired word or phrase, by frequently em- 
ploying it in conjunction with others, the sooner 
and the more intimately will it become amalga- 
mated with the stock in our possession, and the 
more certainly will it recur to us, when required 
for use. 

The fact is, that any word, however insig- 
nificant, with which it has ever been used in 
juxtaposition, may recal the wanderer, either by 
an accidental association of ideas, or by a faint 
recollection — an echo, as it were, of the rhythm 
of the original expression. 

Again, the greater the number of words we 
learn imperfectly before we begin to compose — 
that is, to speak — the greater will be our difficulty 
in using them in conjunction with new ones. 

On the other hand, the smaller the stock of 
words we learn, the greater will be our facility in 
using them, and in amalgamating new ones with 
them. 

As everything that we do, unless we perform 
it with inattention or reluctance, becomes by repe- 
tition, a habit, we must accustom ourselves to make 
active use of each sentence, and of each word, 



36 



MEMORY. 



committed to memory, instead of following the 
passive methods generally prevailing. The majo- 
rity of men who have studied Greek for six or 
eight years are unable to employ the commonest 
words colloquially. The passive inert reception of 
a large number of words through the eyes and 
ears, though recalled thousands of times with intel- 
ligence and attention, is manifestly of little prac- 
tical value for colloquial purposes, because it does 
not fix them in the memory in such a manner 
as to render them readily available in oral com- 
position. 

Mere repetition, therefore, is unavailing; and 
however perfectly we may know words by sight, 
such knowledge is not practical. 

No doubt the memory is refreshed by every 
look at the book, and the next effort to recall the 
words, if made very soon afterwards, will be 
facilitated thereby. But every instance in which 
we actually make use of a word, or of a phrase, in 
the daily practice of oral composition, produces an 
impression on the memory far more efficacious 
and enduring, than that which results from 
recognizing it in a book, from seeking for it 
cursorily in a dictionary, from writing it down, 
from hearing others use it, or from all of these 
combined. 

To their non-observance of this principle, we 
ascribe the failures which occur among men of 



MEMORY. 



37 



education, and even among those who have a taste 
for this pursuit. To their assiduous attention 
to it, we trace the universal success of children. 
To their partial adoption thereof we attribute 
the success of couriers, of missionaries, and of 
other travellers dealing with unwritten languages, 
but especially of those who, under some pressure of 
circumstances, have limited themselves to the 
acquisition, and to the daily employment of a few 
colloquial sentences for some one definite purpose. 

These learn a very few words, but they learn 
them practically and perfectly. But the number 
of words which hard-reading men learn, unpracti- 
cally and imperfectly, is so great that the memory 
is evidently a sieve through which unconnected 
words escape, while it retains those that cohere in 
sentences learned by rote. 

But words may be said to have a threefold 
nature; for, in the minds of educated men, the 
sound and the meaning are inseparably connected 
with the symbols that represent them to the eye. 
But this ideal inseparability is a source of infinite 
difficulty and confusion, from which the uneducated 
are exempt. Hence it happens that many servants, 
who do not attempt to read or write, excel their 
masters in picking up continental languages during 
a short tour. 

In the learning of languages, phonetically 



38 



MEMORY. 



written, less mischief arises, because the be- 
ginner is not much misled by the spelling; but 
in English we find one of the commonest sounds 
variously symbolized by a, e, i, o, u, y, eo, oe, oi, 
io, re, ou, ea, oo, and gh; as in the words aroma, 
verse, bird, dove, murmur, myrrh, dungeon, does, 
porpoise, nation, acre, courage, earth, blood, and 
Edinburgh. But this is only one out of many 
stumbling blocks ; for more than half of our conso- 
nants may be found standing mute, and many of 
them do duty for their neighbours. The letter A 
is employed in nine different ways, as in aroma, 
far, war, was, hat, hate, many, quay, beauty ; and 
the syllable ough has eight different sounds, each 
of which is represented in other words by different 
combinations. The brightest intellects have been 
thrown into confusion by beginning English at the 
wrong end ; and yet, when learned in the right 
way, it is the easiest language in Europe. So fan- 
tastic is that system which we complacently call 
orthography, that no one can determine the pro- 
nunciation of a new word of two syllables. The 
foreigner who learns English, has to contend with 
difficulties not to be surpassed even in the study 
of Chinese ; for the symbols used in the Celestial 
Empire may confound, but they do not mislead him. 
He perseveres, however, because he imagines that 
he is exercising his reasoning powers beneficially ; 
but here is another delusion, for in reality he is 



MEMORY. 



39 



only mystifying himself by making strenuous efforts 
to deduce a number of sounds, in defiance of all 
logic, from anomalous and inconsistent spellings, 
irreconcileable with any fixed principles. The 
sounds elude his grasp like pickpockets, who go 
about begging in the disguise of cripples, and run 
away, leaving their rags in the hands of those who 
try to apprehend them. 

It is difficult enough to learn a short sen- 
tence every day, and to fix the meaning of each 
word, the principle of the constructions, and 
the order of the words, in the memory, so 
that we can employ them all as perfectly as if 
they belonged to our own tongue. But the 
difficulty is greatly increased by undertaking at 
the same time to learn a set of strange symbols, 
or to train ourselves to employ familiar letters in 
an unusual manner. The latter suggest to the 
mind other sounds and other meanings, which 
ought not to be remembered. But we have not 
that control over the memory which enables us 
to dismiss anything from it at will. Much less 
can we discard things of which we are constantly 
reminded by seeing them before our eyes. When 
the spelling of a word suggests a variety of differ- 
ent sounds, uncertainty ensues, and a difficulty is 
gratuitously created which may be avoided by 
merely learning the sound, unwritten. 

When we have to attach new sounds to familiar 



40 



MEMORY. 



letters we become involved in a harassing struggle 
against habits formed in early life. While the 
memory is being exerted to the utmost of its power, 
or, as usually happens, strained far beyond its power, 
in learning new sounds and new combinations of 
words, that unnecessary and irrational conflict 
ought to be avoided. This caution relates espe- 
cially to those who are learning English or French. 
On the same principle, English and French people, 
having been trained to a very eccentric ortho- 
graphy, should never look into a foreign book, 
printed in the Roman character, until they have 
gained some facility in speaking the new language 
with an intelligible pronunciation. 

Beginners ought to abjure the notion that 
words are mere combinations of certain letters, to 
which they owe their origin, and that reading 
is the first step to be taken. Letters are not 
the elements of language, but the rudiments of 
the art of writing, with which millions of our 
fellow men in all parts of the world are still 
unacquainted. 

The Chinese may be forgiven for regarding 
their written symbols as the elements of language. 
Instead of employing alphabetic letters, their fore- 
fathers had recourse to hieroglyphics. These 
indicated the thing signified, and thus they sug- 
gested the sound; but in course of time the 
symbols have gradually become corrupted and 



MEMORY. 



41 



disguised, to such an extent that they now bear no 
resemblance to the objects which they at first 
pictorially represented. Nevertheless custom and 
long prescription justify their retention, because 
the language is now divided into many dialects, 
and each written symbol is universally understood, 
although it has a different name in each province. 
Thus, although they do not understand one 
another's speech, they can all communicate with 
each other in writing. They are justly proud of 
this bond of union, extending through a vast 
empire, and they regard their written characters 
with the deepest veneration, as the source from 
which words sprung. 

But our alphabetical system, in spite of all 
its anomalies and gross inconsistencies, is re- 
garded with almost equal veneration. By a fiction 
it is held to represent sounds correctly and 
logically ; whereas in reality the antagonism sub- 
sisting between the established pronunciation of 
many words and the sounds suggested by the 
spelling is so strong, and it so completely bewilders 
and misleads a beginner, that reading and spelling 
must be discarded altogether at the outset. The 
memory does not require the aid of the eyes, 
because we stipulate that it shall never be over- 
loaded. Children learn the pronunciation of a 
foreign tongue quite perfectly without any artificial 
assistance from letters, and it seems extraordinary 



42 



MEMORY. 



that educated men should accept the delusive aid 
of such rotten crutches, and that teachers should 
encourage them in so doing. 

The more words we attempt to commit to 
memory in any given time, the fewer do we retain ; 
because each word with which we encumber the 
memory beyond its strength, obstructs its freedom 
of action to the same crushing extent that an 
additional stone on the back of a race-horse detracts 
from his speed. It would be a great achievement 
to acquire, in thirty days, three hundred words of 
a language altogether strange and unknown, and 
to carry them at the racing pace with which we 
use those of our own tongue. We have to natu- 
ralize every individual word, so that we can employ 
it with perfect freedom, and without any delibera- 
tion. This degree of efficiency is not attainable, 
except by diligent practice. A child spends the 
livelong day in reiterating the same little sentences, 
with such variations as he can adopt from the 
casual conversations going on around him. He 
acts upon impulse, and in utter ignorance of the 
rationale of the system which nature prompts him 
thus industriously to pursue. Adults may attain 
in a week, as much as he learns in a month ; because 
while we adopt the principle, we systematize the 
process; we discard all that is not essential; we 
avoid all that is obstructive; we bring mature 
faculties to bear upon it; and, without sacrificing 



MEMORY. 



43 



its simplicity, we diversify it by multiplying varia- 
tions, as with a kaleidoscope. 

A vague, erroneous impression prevails that 
much depends upon time, and that it is neces- 
sary to hold intercourse for weeks or months 
with foreigners, in order to acquire the power 
of speaking their language. Time, however, is 
not an ally ; but an enemy always on the 
alert to plunder us of our acquisitions. If we 
work for one hour in every twenty -four, he 
obtains an advantage over us in the ratio of 
twenty-three to one. It is folly and presumption 
to give such odds even to the most contemptible 
foe. In order to hold our own against our inde- 
fatigable enemy, we must encounter him on more 
equal terms. In this contest the better part of 
discretion is valour, and the only effectual strategy 
is to carry the war into the hostile territory ; to 
set our whole forces in motion every two or three 
hours; and never to let a straggler fall into the 
enemy's hands, without an immediate rush to the 
rescue. 

But it is not from time, nor from books, 
nor from teachers, but from the frequency and 
earnestness of our own personal efforts to naturalize 
useful sentences, that our success in oral compo- 
sition proceeds. In the selection of those sentences, 
judgment must be exercised; but when they are 
once chosen, we have only to commit them to 



44 



MEMORY. 



memory, and to obtain fluency in using all the 
variations. No one can do this for us, nor even aid 
us in doing it. We must be self-taught, except as 
to pronunciation. 

That thorough practical knowledge of a small 
stock of well-chosen sentences, which exhibits itself 
by fluency in using them, ought to be acquired 
before we mingle with those who speak the lan- 
guage. 

Some people go abroad, and live in a foreign 
family, without knowing ten words of the language, 
trusting to reading, to grammar, to time, to ear, 
to nature, to necessity, to guess-work, and to 
chance to teach them ; and with all these teachers 
they break down. 

Instead of consorting with children, who keep 
up an incessant chatter with one or two hundred 
words, arranged in idiomatic sentences of different 
constructions, and strictly practical, they betake 
themselves to grammar and analysis, and associate 
with educated adults, who carefully avoid repe- 
titions, and who speak the whole language. 

They are advised to go abroad and practise 
talking, because " practice makes perfect," and 
" use is everything." But they receive no definite, 
specific instructions. They do not know what to 
practise, and they are puzzled how to practise that 
which they cannot do at all. 

The necessity for acquiring something definite 



MEMORY. 



45 



and useful, every day, is ignored. Talking implies 
understanding what is spoken; but this essential 
qualification is totally wanting, and therefore it 
seems natural and necessary at first to sit and 
listen. 

Thus situated, the beginner has firstly to divine, 
from the looks and gestures of two foreigners, what 
subject they are talking about; then to make crude 
conjectures as to the purport of some one sentence ; 
then to retrace the airy path through which the 
winged words have flown, in order to recapture the 
lost sounds; then to allot by guess-work two or 
three sounds to each word; then to assign at a 
venture a meaning to each word; and finally to 
treasure them up, right or wrong, in the memory, 
while new sounds are still falling in rapid succes- 
sion on his ear, and distracting his attention. 

As reasonably might a photographer, regardless 
of intervening objects, attempt to take the likenesses 
of individuals walking along a crowded street. 

On the other hand, those who learn useful 
sentences by heart, and who seize every possible 
opportunity of employing them, are invariably 
successful. 

In fact there is no method however obstructive 
or irrational, that will not be rectified and vivified, 
at any stage, by the practice of oral composition, 
on the basis of a few well chosen sentences. 

But as this is a perfect process, all-sufficient 



46 



MEMORY. 



of itself, and comprehensive enough to exercise the 
finest memory to the utmost of its power, we 
protest against all attempts to dilute it, by com- 
bining it in the first stage with grammar, or with 
any book-system, because all such methods are 
antagonistic to it. They overload the memory, and 
confuse the intellect ; and are therefore subversive 
of that principle which recommends itself to us 
by its extreme simplicity, and by its never-failing 
success among children. 

As the power of the memory in retaining new 
words is very limited, reason requires that we 
should select the primary sentences in such a 
manner, that they shall be capable of representing 
the greatest possible number of ideas, and that we 
should know the precise extent of the latent power 
of expression which they possess, and definitely 
ascertain and master all the different forms in 
which they may be arranged, before we encumber 
the memory with more words. 

Thus alone can we guard against the usual 
deplorable waste of time and labour. 

Children learn very few words at first; but 
they acquire, by assiduous practice, the art, which 
is nothing more than the habit, of using them with 
fluency. 

Every new word has to be worked into those 
practical sentences which they have learned by 
rote ; and by the time they can interweave thirty or 



MEMORY. 



47 



forty words, the chief difficulty of speaking is over- 
come. Thus, when the adult student has acquired 
this fluency with a few practical sentences, he is 
relieved from the necessity of deliberating as to 
the order in which the words are to be arranged * 
his memory becomes capable of receiving and 
retaining, without confusion, more words than it 
could compass at first ; and he obtains abundant 
compensation for the apparently insignificant pro- 
gress which he made, when restricted to learning 
a very little every day. 

If a beginner thinks himself too clever to 
master less than thirty or forty foreign words every 
day, he will find the first experiment as galling 
and exhausting as the Earey ■ process is to an 
obstreperous horse, when he is struggling against 
his own weight and strength. The longer he 
recalcitrates, the more thoroughly will he be con- 
vinced of the injustice done to the memory by 
overburdening it, and of the wisdom of hobbling it, 
and circumscribing its freedom, so as to ascertain 
its power, or rather to prove its weakness at once. 
However quick and retentive the memory may be, 
it cannot work beyond its strength. This is a 
truism, but in the acquisition of languages, it 
seems to be absolutely ignored. 

It is a mere schoolboy notion to try how 
many words can be "got by heart" in a limited 
time, irrespectively of that perfect practical 



48 



MEMORY. 



retention of them, without which the labour is 
in vain. 

Most people complain of the treachery or 
weakness of the memory, but no one can know the 
extent of its incapacity until it has been formally 
tested. 

The knowledge of a given number of words, 
is the power of using every one of them, with 
promptitude and fluency, in a variety of idiomatic 
combinations. 

Fluency in a foreign tongue is generally attri- 
buted to cleverness in adults, but in children it is 
nothing more than exactitude in repeating, inter- 
changing, and transposing the phrases and words 
which they have learned by rote. 

If we learn in the first instance nothing but 
complete sentences, the power of recollecting and 
reproducing them is obviously a mere exertion of 
the memory, and it requires no greater range of 
intellect than that which a little child possesses, to 
interchange the words. 

But to reproduce sentences verbatim, is to 
speak idiomatically; and therefore the genuine 
colloquial knowledge of a language is attained by 
repeated efforts of the memory, not by vigorous 
exertions of the reasoning faculties. 



CHAPTER IV, 



EVOLUTIONS OF LANGUAGE. 

rpHE next question for consideration is how 
that copiousness of speech which children 
exhibit, can be consistent with a very small voca- 
bulary; how it takes its rise; and how we may 
extract, from a few words, the greatest possible 
results, and obtain them with the smallest possible 
effort. 

When, after a few weeks' residence abroad, a 
child, ten years old, pours forth without deliberation, 
hesitation, or effort, hundreds of sentences, many 
of which are purely idiomatical, we know that it 
is not to superior intelligence, nor to a thorough 
knowledge of the principles of grammar, that he is 
indebted for his success. So great is his com- 
mand over the four or five scores of words which 
he has treasured up, that they seem to have a, 

E 



50 



EVOLUTIONS OF LANGUAGE. 



mysterious power of resolving themselves into 
idiomatic combinations. It is evident that some 
powerful agency is at work. It would be idle to 
contend that such combinations result from words 
learned incoherently ; for all experience runs counter 
to that conjecture. We therefore trace their 
parentage without hesitation to those ready-made 
sentences which children first acquire. And we 
find that it is not from any special aptitude, either 
in the child, or in the successful linguist, that their 
" mastery " of speech originates : but that there is a 
property of growth and expansion in language 
itself, whenever it is rightly received, and fairly 
treated. 

For when sentences are harmoniously com- 
bined, they have a reproductive power, whereby 
they yield an astonishing number of variations, 
obtained by interchanges of the words. • And this 
increase is in geometrical progression, the result 
being in proportion to the length of the sentences ; 
that is, to the number of interchangeable words 
which they contain. The only condition to be 
observed in framing the sentences, is that there 
shall be so much congruity between the individual 
words in each column, that they may be changed 
from one sentence to another without prejudice 
either to the sense, or to the grammatical con- 
struction. 



EVOLUTIONS OF LANGUAGE. 



51 



For in any two sentences prepared according 
to these stipulations, and on the following plan : 



A 


C 


E 


G 


I 


1 E 


M 


O 


Q 


S 


U 


W 


B 


D 


F 


H 


J 


! L 


1ST 


P 


E 


T 


V 


X 



any four words, K, L, M, N, will yield four combina- 
tions : as, KM, KN, LM, LN ; and any two others, as 
I and J, added to them, will double the number of 
combinations, thus, IKM, IKN ? ILM, ILN ; JKM, 
JKN, JLM, JLN. So any two other congruous 
words, whether prefixed or affixed, or inserted 
in the middle of any sentence, will double the 
number. 

To be still more explicit, two clauses are 
annexed which comprise 2x2x2x2 or 16 com- 
binations, each of which contains four words : 



I 


K 


M 


O 


My 


brother 


came 


in 


J 


L 


N 


P 


His 


servant 


went 


out 


IZMO 


IKNO 


IKMP 


IKNP 


JKMO 


JKNO 


JKMP 


JKNP 


ILMO 


ILNO 


ILMP 


ILNP 


JLMO 


jmo 


JLMP 


JLNP 



By this arrangement of the letters, the alpha- 
betical is made to represent the idiomatic sequence, 
which is thus preserved inviolate throughout all 
the variations. 



52 



EVOLUTIONS OF LANGUAGE. 



The annexed table shows the scale of progres- 
sion : 

4 words give 4 combinations of 2 words each. 



6 




8 


>) 


3 


if 


8 


?> 


16 


ii 


4 


»j 


10 




32 


>? 


5 


>y 


12 


» 


64 




6 


3? 


14 




128 




7 


7) 


16 




256 




8 


?? 


18 


5) 


512 




9 


35 


20 


>> 


1024 




10 


>> 


40 


1,024,000 




20 





When three sentences of ten words each are - 
constructed on the same principle, the combinations 
amount to 59,049, that is 3 10 . 

Now two such sentences give 1,024, or 2 1 . . 

Therefore the number of sentences being N, 
and that of the words in each sentence being x, the 
direct variations produced by interchanging the 
words of each column, without transposing any of 
them, will be N x . 

As the basis, we take each word as a unit, 
exactly in that form in which we find it standing 
in the original sentence. 

It is obvious that a great number of words 
may be put into one column ; but that arrangement 
would be equivalent to the wretched system of 
learning lists of nouns, verbs, &c, and it is only 
mentioned in this place to be reprobated. 

When twelve words are irregularly placed in 



EVOLUTIONS OF LANGUAGE. 



53 



three columns, containing three, four, and five of 
them respectively, the results are 3x4x5, or 60 
combinations of three words each. 

But when they are arranged in two sentences 
of equal length, the results are 64 combinations of 
six words each. 

When there is a blank in any column, or when 
the same word recurs, there can be no increase. 
But there is harmony in clauses as well as in 
words ; and therefore, no practically useful form 
of speech need be rejected. 

The results above exhibited may be greatly 
increased by transposing the words ; because the 
same law of progression applies to the indirect 
variations thus produced. 

Another addition accrues from those words 
which have more than one meaning, because they 
contribute to the formation of additional sentences 
in another language. 

The endless variety of combinations derivable 
from a few words, has often been noticed ; but the 
fecundity of sentences, and the law by which the 
evolutions are regulated, seem to have escaped 
attention. The principle is essentially practical, 
because every common useful sentence, which is 
constructed according to the genius of the language 
to which it belongs, may be matched with another, 
partially, if not wholly corresponding to it. It is evi- 
dent that by a strict adoption of this arrangement 



54 



EVOLUTIONS OF LANGUAGE. 



of words, with its limitations in consideration of 
the weakness of the m'emory, the beginner may 
regulate his progress with a degree of precision 
approaching to mathematical certainty. But 
coupled sentences are not to be considered essen- 
tial, nor need they extend beyond ten words in 
length. 

When sentences, carefully adjusted to each 
other, have been "mastered," there arises an 
attraction of cohesion which binds all the words 
compactly together, and which prevents any con- 
fusion of tongues, by producing a feeling of repug- 
nance to the introduction of any alien word. This 
safeguard is unattainable by those who are learning 
the words of two languages at once, in the old 
incoherent fashion, instead of " mastering " them in 
their proper combinations. 

In showing that well-chosen sentences yield 
results proportionate to their length, we detect a 
weak point in most of the prevailing methods of 
learning languages. One reason for the numerous 
failures, the slow progress, and the generally small 
success which attends the first efforts of those who 
attempt to speak a language, is the practice of 
beginning with very short sentences, not har- 
monizing with each other ; not strictly practical ; 
not containing all the parts of speech ; and, above 
all, not £t mastered." 

There is an impression that logical and 



EVOLUTIONS OF LANGUAGE. 



55 



mathematical propriety requires that we should pro- 
ceed gradually from short to long sentences. But 
this is a delusion, inasmuch as the reasoning powers 
are not called into action, and the memory can 
deal with thirty words, in three sentences, as easily 
as when they are cut down into ten. But in the 
former arrangement the direct variations alone are 
3 1 . , or 59,049 sentences of ten words each, whereas 
in the latter the results cannot exceed 10 3 , or 
1,000 sentences, having only three words each. 
In practice the latter can be of little value, because 
they are incapable of extension into longer sen- 
tences; whereas the longer include thousands of 
shorter ones, besides the direct variations enume- 
rated. 

We have spoken of each word as a unit; but 
in truth some are twofold, and some threefold. In 
the words vocas, rogat, pugnant, each of the dis- 
tinctive personal terminations retains its indivi- 
duality as a word, and by transferring them from 
one root to the others we obtain nine combina- 
tions. So, vocabit and rogavimus contain three 
words each, which form eight combinations when 
they are interchanged: thus, vocabit, vocabimus, 
vocavit, vocavimus ; rogabit, rogabimus, rogavit, 
rogavimus. 

With these facts before him, the beginner must 
determine how many words he will " master" at 
each effort; and he must restrict himself to that 



56 



EVOLUTIONS OF LANGUAGE. 



number, because it is by seeing and hearing addi- 
tional words that the memory becomes clogged; 
and because the estimates generally formed of the 
power of that faculty are erroneous in the 
extreme. 

The bewilderment experienced by men of the 
clearest intellect, after two or three weeks' study 
of grammar, may be easily accounted for by the 
application of this principle of evolution. If 
columns were opened for sentences comprising the 
most useful tenses of six verbs, together with all 
the pronouns and articles, and half-a-dozen prepo- 
sitions and nouns of any inflected language, the 
accumulation of figures representing the result of 
the combinations would be appalling. With this 
burden on his back, and with his limbs bound with 
the cords of hard rules, relentlessly knotted with 
exceptions and qualifications, the only wonder is 
that a beginner can stagger through his work 
at all. 

But the stronger the memory, the greater is 
the confidence, the greater is the burden under- 
taken, and the greater is the bewilderment pro- 
duced by learning unconnected words. Thus it 
is that some of the most complete failures have 
occurred amongst the cleverest people. But the 
same obfuscation will be produced by attempting to 
learn too much, in whatever form it may be under- 
taken. Therefore, while avoiding short sentences, 



EVOLUTIONS OF LANGUAGE. , 57 



the beginner must pay due regard to the expansive 
power of those which are selected to be learned 
first. And, if he is not too proud to learn the 
pronunciation of a sentence before he begins to 
use it, let him restrain his ambition, let him tread 
in the little footprints of children, and let him 
" master " the first few sentences without any 
thought of competing either with time, or with 
other people. 

It is only by chance that children learn those 
expansive combinations which suddenly amplify 
their power of speech. They do not search for 
them, nor do they manufacture them; but when 
they learn them by accident, the evolutions become 
possible, and they are gradually brought into use 
without any discernment of the principle on which 
they expand. 

Children learn to talk, not by laborious 
conversational efforts for an hour at a time, 
three times a week; nor by scientific analysis, 
and careful study of elegant authors for six or 
eight hours a day; but by never allowing half 
an hour to pass by, without repeating, inter- 
changing, and transposing the whole stock of 
idiomatic sentences which they have learned by 
heart. It is thus that they "master" all the 
combinations seriatim. It is thus that the mind 
becomes first imbued, and then saturated with 
the foreign idiom. 



58 t EVOLUTIONS OF LANGUAGE. 

The " mastery " of a few words must be, in 
every instance, the precursor to the more exten- 
sive colloquial power. Here is the vestibule 
through which all must pass, whether their pre- 
liminary operations have included a score, a 
hundred, a thousand, or ten thousand words. 

So far as self-instruction in foreign tongues is 
possible, this method will strongly recommend itself 
to those who have acquired the pronunciation in 
childhood; to those who are altogether indifferent 
to it, and to those who can accept the two simple 
propositions, that it is easier to attain fluency and 
idiomatic accuracy with a few words than with 
a great number ; and that it is only by practice 
that fluency can be gained. 

The computation given above relates avowedly 
to an artificial adaptation of sentences one to 
another, with a view to exhibiting the nature of 
that great command of words which children 
insensibly obtain, while expressing their thoughts 
in foreign forms of speech. But there is no 
necessity for beginners to deviate from the natural 
course of learning single sentences, provided that 
they secure to themselves the advantage which 
inevitably follows from " mastering " practical 
combinations, each containing about twenty words. 
The subdivisions, or minor combinations of long 
sentences, will be numerous enough to afford 
abundant exercise for the memory, and therefore 



EVOLUTIONS OF LANGUAGE. 



59 



the samples, which have been thrown together 
for selection for ordinary use, have no special 
relation to each other; and the order in which 
they are placed may be reversed or altered at 
pleasure. 

A few coupled sentences, however, have also 
been provided for those who are curious to ascer- 
tain how many words they can "master" in two 
days. Such experiments ought to be conducted in 
a series, in the ascending ratio ; for the descending 
scale would be mere self- stultification. Three or 
four efforts in each day, to " master " four words at 
a time, at regularly divided intervals, would settle 
the question very expeditiously; but an entirely 
strange language must be taken up, and perfect 
fluency must be made the criterion of success on 
each occasion. When the conditions are faithfully 
observed, the distaste which is so generally felt for 
this pursuit will be counteracted, and the foreign 
forms of expression, complicated and unnatural as 
they may appear at first sight, will haunt the 
memory even in the midst of the most congenial 
occupations. 

As the whole system is founded upon the detec- 
tion of a speciality in the child's mode of procedure, 
which has been hitherto unnoticed, and as it is im- 
possible to pass an impartial judgment upon it with- 
out some personal experience of the nature of the 
operation of " mastering" foreign words, the candid 



60 



EVOLUTIONS OF LANGUAGE. 



critic is entreated to qualify himself by making 
one experiment with twelve or fourteen words, all 
at once, before he condemns it. He should learn a 
couple of sentences of some language quite unknown 
to him, and having no resemblance to any of those 
with which he may be acquainted. If the attention 
be then exclusively devoted for three hours to some 
other pursuit, the difficulty of rapidly reproducing 
the variations of the sentences will be acknow- 
ledged. But let the experiment be continued 
until perfect fluency has been attained, and then it 
will be admitted that the memory is severely 
tasked in trying to " master" a few words with 
their manifold variations all at one effort. 

If, in addition to this, he desires to make the 
same experiment upon others, two or three victims 
should be selected, and they should be kept in. 
ignorance as to the object in view. It is not alto- 
gether needless to remark that experiments made 
by persons who have adopted decided opinions 
regarding the scheme cannot possibly yield any 
instructive results, because the operations of 
the memory are influenced to a great extent by 
alacrity on the one hand, and repugnance on the 
other. 

The experimentalists need not learn either 
the true pronunciation, or the hieroglyphics, 
or the orthography, but it must not be for- 
gotten that those difficulties would have to be 



60* 



COUPLED SENTENCES 

Wherewith to Test the Retentive Power of the Memory in "Mastering" 
or Instantaneously Reproducing the Interchanged Words of some 
Language quite unknown to the Learner. 



12 3 * a e 

A Fy mlant aforchogasant ynfuan arhyd yffordd. 



Ccrr tats?- 



12 3 4 5 6 

A My children rode rapidly along the road. 



vr U IZkolfi *#./ 1 2 3 4 5 6 ' / /j! • ' < 

5 Ei gweinpn agodiasarat ynaraf ardraws yeae. ^ . /' 

1 2 3 4 5 6 

£ Her servants walked slowly across the field. 



1 2 3 4 5 6 7 

C Do scargad na blata an mo ngardad. 

3 4 5 6 7 1-2 

C The flowers in my garden died. 

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 

D Nir crionad moran lilige re se macaire. 

3 4 2 1 5 6 7 

D Some lilies withered not near the field. 



1 2 3 4 5 6 7 

E Atani basa ku na pettelu yenduku pumpinawu. 

6 7 4 5 3 1 2 

E Why did you send my boxes to his house ? 

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 

F Mi ara lonunchi a wuttaralu yeppudu techinadu. 

6 7 4 5 3 1 2 

F When did he bring those letters from your room ? 



COUPLED SENTENCES — Continued. 



1 2 3 4 5 6 7 

G Uska bara bhai jahaz par khelta hai. 

1 2 3 7 6 5 4 
G His big brother is playing on shipboard. 

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 

// Mera chota beta gari men sota tha. 

1 2 3 7 6 5 4 

H My little son was sleeping in the cart. 



1 2 3 4 5 6 7 

/ Nir criognugadar na dleaedoiride raoran maiteasa mora. 

3 4 1-2 5 7 6 

/ The statesmen accomplished few great results. 

l 2 a 4 5 6 7 

J Do gnoduigadar na caitreacuib iomad tarba oirdearea. 

3 4 1-2 5 7 6 

J The citizens attained many important advantages. 



12345 6 7 89 10 

K Ng do ahko iao tao sianggying difong kyi tso sangi. 

12 3 4 8567 9 10 

K Your eldest brother wishes to go to a near place to do business. 

12 345 6 789 10 

L Ngo siao ahpang we dzong yunyun zingli lse zing sangweh. 

1 2 34 85 6 7 9 10 

L My youngest uncle will come from a distant city to seek work. 



1 2 3 4 5 6 7 

M Anken rawkav awb ekaw ly bite aynu. 

1 4 3 2 5 7 6 

M But your father rode to our house. 

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 

N Vy hawlak abed o my kaphar awm. 

1 4 3 2 5 7 6 

N And his servant went from their village. 



EVOLUTIONS OF LANGUAGE. 



61 



superadded if they desired to acquire the language 
in earnest. 

Every Englishman's feeling leads him to prefer 
the traditional policy of obtaining a potential 
command over a language, by means of grammar 
and analysis; and he instinctively shrinks from 
subjecting his attainments to that rigorous test of 
fluency which may reduce the results of three 
months' hard study to an unpleasantly small 
compass ; perhaps to nil. But there is a great 
difference between the potential command, and that 
real, actual u mastery" of words which is only to be 
obtained by practising oral composition. When 
he first puts his memory to the proof by a 
series of experiments, the results will not be 
flattering. But they must not be discredited on 
that account. 

There are not many men who have learned 
at the rate of four Latin, or two Greek words 
every day ; and there are very few who have 
" mastered " one tenth part of that number. But 
as oral composition is generally excluded from our 
schools, lest perhaps we should corrupt one an- 
other's classical taste, it is no reproach to us. The 
fact, however, is important, as indicating that the 
"mastering" of words, and the gauging of the 
memory by the exercise of oral composition, have 
not been brought systematically under the obser- 
vation of those, who, from their position, are 



62 



EVOLUTIONS OF LANGUAGE. 



regarded as the highest authorities on the subject 
of education. 

Considering that the memory is the engine prin- 
cipally employed, it is very singular that we have 
no data for determining, even approximately, its 
power of " mastering" foreign words. The maximum 
performances of gifted men have been recorded, 
but they only tend to foster the prevailing delusion 
of immensely overrating its power of retention, 
and of assuming that its range is co-extensive with 
that of the understanding. 

People who go abroad to learn French or 
German, on the most approved principles, studying 
with the best masters, and living with a foreign 
family, seldom express themselves with facility in 
less than three months. At that stage, the stock 
of words which they actually employ is generally 
about three hundred ; although they may recognize 
six, eight, or ten times that number, when they 
meet with them in books. But such persons often 
appear to be speechless during the first six weeks, 
being incapable of disentangling a few useful 
sentences from that confused mass of words, of 
which they have only indistinct recollections, as of 
things seen or heard long ago. It appears then, 
that during the first three months, they attain, 
with difficulty, an imperfect knowledge of less than 
four words a day. 

It is very clear that they make a false start ; 



EVOLUTIONS OF LANGUAGE. 



63 



that their energies are misdirected ; and that they 
encumber themselves by attempting too much at 
first. When suddenly called upon to converse, at 
the end of six weeks of hard study, they pump up 
their words, one by one, with slow and convulsive 
efforts ; not with that readiness which results from 
knowing a few sentences perfectly, which some- 
times awakens a feeling, as of the sudden develop- 
ment of a new sense, and affords a most effectual 
stimulus to further exertions. 

As children, ten years old, generally pick up 
about three or four foreign words a day, which 
they wield far better than the students aforesaid, 
let no man attempt more, if he believes that chil- 
dren have a natural superiority over adults. And 
let those who dissent from that opinion, but have 
not put it to the proof, proceed cautiously at first, 
lest in practice they disable their own judgment ; 
and lest they become bewildered before they have 
" mastered" fifty words. 

Nothing is more to be deprecated than the 
impetuosity with which a youth plunges into the 
intricacies of a foreign language, relying, with 
unbounded confidence, on his power of learning by 
dint of laborious and protracted study. If strength 
of intellect were required, he would be in the 
right; but when the high-bred horse is employed 
on an emergency to draw a load of hay, he is not 
expected to gallop, but to take a few slow steps at 



64 



EVOLUTIONS OF LANGUAGE. 



a time, and to wait patiently, while his load is 
being gradually heaped up, and adjusted. If 
he does go off at a gallop, he must of necessity 
exert his strength in a most disadvantageous 
manner. 

The computations given above seem to prove 
that all those who have contrived in a short 
time to speak a foreign tongue idiomatically, 
without books or study, must have succeeded in 
proportion to their fortuitous approximation to the 
practice of learning ready-made sentences of proper 
length. 

The great Cardinal himself must have trodden 
in this path, but he did so unwittingly, for if he 
had discerned the principle, he would easily have 
eclipsed all his recorded achievements. We are 
told that he learned sentences and phrases by heart ; 
and that the same words were very frequently 
repeated in his conversations with foreigners. But 
he did not restrict himself to sentences ; he over- 
charged his fine memory with unconnected words, 
which were not carefully selected, but were in many 
instances taken at hazard ; he did not know how 
to lay his trains of words with certainty ; nor did 
he discover the electric spark wherewith to fire 
them at will. 

It is a common remark that illiterate 
people employ only three or four hundred words. 
This assertion, though not authenticated, passes 



EVOLUTIONS OF LANGUAGE. 



65 



unchallenged; and yet people go on cramming 
themselves with words, as if the volubility, occa- 
sionally observed among the peasantry, would not 
suffice for a beginner; or as if it were impos- 
sible to learn too many words at once; or as if 
the cqpia verborum would necessarily lead to the 
copia fandi. 

The poverty of the language of children and 
illiterate people, is often spoken of with contempt ; 
and the paucity of their words is ignorantly sup- 
posed to indicate the paucity of their ideas. But 
Euclid is never spoken of as a man of few 
words, or of few ideas, and yet he contrived to 
write his first six books with less than four 
hundred words. 

If the most exact of all the sciences can be 
luminously expounded with so small a stock of 
words, and if people of great intelligence, among 
the lower orders, can communicate all their ideas, 
on the multifarious transactions of a busy life, with 
a similar number, we scarcely require to refer to 
the evolutions, to prove that beginners ought to 
restrict themselves to a limited number of words, 
instead of indiscriminately aspiring to a whole 
language at once. 

The complement for an educated man is said 
to be four thousand words, and it is highly 
desirable that it should be gradually attained. 
But people generally work without prospectively 

F 



66 



EVOLUTIONS OF LANGUAGE. 



fixing any limit to their acquisitions. The 
dictionary gives the idea of interminability, and 
great scholars pursue the study of a language for 
twenty, thirty, or forty years, and it still remains 
unexhausted and inexhaustible. Influenced by 
such examples, and acting upon the notion that 
the indefinite course is the right one, men pore 
over their books, and obtain an eye-knowledge 
of many thousands of words, while the colloquial 
part of the work is postponed till the Greek 
Kalends. 

We are not bound to give credit to the asser- 
tion that the illiterate employ only three or four 
hundred words, but it is true that they seldom 
exceed that number in conversing on any one 
subject. If then one man or woman can be found 
who speaks fluently and well with so small a stock, 
a learner will have full exercise for his memory, 
ample scope for study and practice, and sufficient 
material for expressing his thoughts on all ordinary 
subjects, within the same limit. 

With a supply of less than a hundred foreign 
words, there are many people who seem to be very 
communicative on their travels. But no two 
beginners ever exhibit precisely the same degree of 
readiness both in understanding, and in making 
themselves understood. Comparisons are therefore 
useless and mischievous. Those who have the 
smallest stock are often more successful in speaking 



EVOLUTIONS OF LANGUAGE. 



67 



than the possessors of thousands of words. This 
sort of success should be the learner's aim ; but he 
is not to stop short when he attains the minimum. 
On the contrary, he ought not to make a single 
day's pause in his career, but to proceed, step by 
step, to the full colloquial "mastery" of the lan- 
guage. Nil actum reputans, dum quid superesset 
agendum. 



CHAPTER V. 



THE PROCESS. 

IT must be borne in mind that this scheme is 
strictly initiatory, and that it is specially de- 
signed for those who have not, or imagine that they 
have not, the organ of language well developed. It 
only professes to furnish a clue to facilitate the 
pilgrim's progress through that labyrinth of words, 
in which so many become bewildered in the first 
week. 

Adults learn to talk by various methods, more 
or less philosophical ; but a child, ten years old, 
has greater success in a shorter time, and with less 
exertion ; and his operations will bear comparison 
in their results with the most scientific processes. 
By dint of a succession of efforts of observation, 
imitation, and repetition at very short intervals, 
he contrives both to understand and to speak a 
foreign language in a few weeks. This twofold 



70 



THE PROCESS. 



process baffles an educated adult, because he has 
been trained to observe words more than sentences ; 
and he tries rather to understand, than to reproduce 
what is spoken. Uneducated people, on the other 
hand, follow the child's course, and learn ready 
made sentences, except when they are misled by 
the example or the advice of their betters. 

As a child puts no restriction on himself in 
listening to the conversations going on around him, 
his progress is often seriously retarded thereby. 
His impulse is to revert to the sentence which was 
previously running in his head, but during the 
distraction of his attention, a very valuable one 
may slip from the memory, not to be recovered 
perhaps for months, when he may chance to hear it 
again. This gives to his progress an uncertainty, 
which we can avoid by learning selected sentences 
in a regular systematic manner. 

The confusion created in the minds of adults 
by hearing a multiplicity of words, uttered at the 
rate of two hundred in a minute, may be effectually 
prevented by separating the two processes above 
mentioned. It is a great simplification of the work 
to learn to speak first, without attempting to 
understand what is spoken. It is better to learn 
one practical sentence thoroughly, than to sit 
listening for hours to the conversation of foreigners, 
because most of the words that we hear are lost; 
the few unconnected words which we recall are of 



THE PROCESS. 



71 



very little value, being guessed and learned at 
hazard; and those which we partially remember do 
us positive and permanent harm, through the inac- 
curacy of the impressions which they leave behind. 

The attention is severely tasked, but not in a 
rational way, for nothing definite or practical is 
gained, commensurate with the exertion put forth ; 
and the little that is remembered escapes again, for 
want of timely recapitulations. The learner is 
puzzled, fatigued, and discouraged ; and each 
succeeding effort of a similar kind leads to still 
further encumbrance of the memory, by increasing 
the stock of half- forgotten and mis-remembered 
words. Heading adds to this accumulation, and 
grammar complicates the difficulty, and intensifies 
the confusion. 

It will be a boon to beginners if we can 
rescue them from that false position in which they 
find themselves placed when they have acquired a 
bad habit of pronunciation, and have loaded the 
memory with a crude, undigested mass of incohe- 
rent words. 

Those who only wish for a useful smattering of 
a language, need not undertake more than the first 
and fourth parts of the following process, before 
they go abroad. 

Those who condemn the system at first sight, 
as slow and ineffective, must bear in mind that its 
object is to exempt them from the dreary study of 



72 



THE PROCESS. 



grammar, and yet to enable them to speak with 
fluency, and idiomatic purity. If, protesting 
against the division of the child's process into two 
parts, they resolve to travel abroad unprepared, let 
them go and prosper ; but let them avoid books, 
and abandon the vague hazy notion that the power 
of speaking any language will come unsought, or 
be acquired by mere listening. 

The beginner need not be under any appre- 
hension about forsaking the old beaten track; 
because, as the scheme is unfolded, it will be seen 
that instead of those incomplete, uncertain, inde- 
finite acquirements which shrink from all scrutiny 
at the outset, it will insure a steady, clearly- 
defined advance from day to day. 

I. During the first stage, which is to be regarded 
principally as a study of pronunciation, five or six 
sentences, containing altogether about a hundred 
words, are to be committed to memory, one by one, 
very perfectly. The true sounds and the proper 
intonation of each clause are to be acquired by 
employing a native to say them, over and over, 
and by diligently echoing, and striving to appro- 
priate his utterance of them. This exercise should 
never exceed ten minutes at a time, but it may be 
repeated several times a day; and the oftener it is 
resumed at intervals, the better will be the pro- 
nunciation. No talking should be allowed while 



THE PROCESS. 



73 



it is going on, because, whatever may be the 
amount of success, the imitative exercise should 
be continued, in order that the habit may be 
confirmed. 

The clause or phrase, which he undertakes to 
learn first, is not to be analysed, or even divided 
into words, until an easy and correct utterance of 
the whole of its combined sounds has been obtained. 
A translation may then be received, with a full 
explanation of each word ; but the beginner must 
not ask for the nominative case, or the root, or 
for any other variety of any word. 

As the memory is not to be trusted to reproduce 
unfamiliar sounds and tones, and as the learner is 
not to see their symbolic representatives on paper, 
nor even to imagine the spelling, he must begin 
every lesson by echoing the teacher's voice in the 
utterance of all the words that have been previously 
acquired. 

The exclusive, restrictive character of this 
scheme constitutes its strength. The learner's 
path is fenced in, and he must not overleap the 
barriers. 

Grammars and all other books are forbidden. 

On the principle that all the words of the first 
sentence are to be utilized to the utmost, before 
the memory receives an additional burden, the 
teacher must see what minor combinations it will 
afford, without any transposition of the words ; and 



74 



THE PROCESS. 



he must utter these aloud, one after another, that 
the beginner may echo them, and thus fix them in 
his memory. 

The clauses of the second sentence are to be 
acquired in like manner, one by one, and the words 
are to be interchanged with those of the first, in 
such a manner as to accomplish the gradual unifi- 
cation of the whole stock. But no changes of case 
or tense are to be permitted, and the beginner 
must never presume to compose a sentence inde- 
pendently for himself. 

Translations of the minor sentences into the 
learner's mother tongue must be kept as an exer- 
cise-book for constant use. When he can translate 
all of them as correctly and as fluently as he uses 
his native language, but not till then, he may 
begin the third sentence. The first two, however, 
are not be laid aside like worn-out garments, only 
to be used on a rainy day. But he must diligently 
recapitulate their variations, with the words of 
each new clause interwoven among them. This is 
the most effectual and easy way of fixing new 
words in the memory, without the drudgery of 
learning them by mere repetition. 

If the learner ever begins a new sentence 
before he has gained a perfect " mastery " over all 
those preceding it, he violates the principle on 
which the scheme is founded, and in so doing he 
abandons it altogether. For the words are either 



THE PROCESS. 



75 



known or unknown. They either float on the sur- 
face of the memory, or sink into the mud. Gra- 
dations of knowledge are inadmissible, for if we 
recognise any middle state, all becomes confusion 
and disorder. 

Facility in wielding the combinations of a sen- 
tence, is not to be acquired by neglecting them, 
and proceeding, re infecta, to bestow the whole 
attention upon another, equally complicated, and 
capable of immensely increasing the number of 
combinations, by interchanges of the words. 

The notion that this may be done with 
impunity, has led to the downfall of many an 
enthusiastic beginner; but the fallacy is worn so 
completely threadbare, that it is easy to see 
through it, when it is held up to the light. It 
took its rise during the time when a language was 
treated as a huge mass of incoherent words. But 
the sterility of unconnected words, and the waste 
of time in acquiring them, are not less conspicuous 
than the fecundity of practical sentences, and the 
economy of time and labour secured by learning 
them by rote, and then " mastering" their 
variations. 

The difficulty or perhaps impossibility of find- 
ing teachers of pronunciation, does not constitute a 
defect in this system. It only leaves the learner 
where it found him, out of reach of the requisite 
appliances, but still on a par with the majority, 



76 



THE PROCESS. 



who pronounce a foreign tongue just as they speak 
their own. That course may be very convenient, 
but nature and reason loudly protest against it. 
For when our first sentence proves to be incompre- 
hensible to the native to whom we address it, they 
warn us, very significantly, that we ought to learn 
to pronounce it intelligibly, before we undertake 
the second. But routine rides roughshod over 
reason and nature, and tramples them in the dust. 

There is nothing which so greatly disturbs all 
calculations, and produces so much confusion in 
the discussion of the problem before us, as the 
various degrees of difficulty experienced by begin- 
ners in acquiring a foreign pronunciation. There 
are some languages in which it may be attained in 
two or three days to a very useful extent, by means 
of numerous short lessons. If the reader, then, will 
admit the possibility of thus acquiring the pronun- 
ciation separately at the outset, the process will 
stand on its own merits, independently of the imita- 
tive talents of the learners. In beginning the 
classical languages, all are upon an equal footing. 
The faculty of reproducing unfamiliar sounds, is not 
brought into requisition ; and whether it be feebly 
or powerfully developed, the learner's progress is 
neither impeded nor accelerated' thereby. 

The philosophy of the practice of learning a 
great many foreign words imperfectly, and when 
they are forgotten, learning them over and over 



THE PROCESS. 



77 



again, is inscrutable. As a Sisyphean occupation 
for little boys, it is an excellent contrivance. This 
mysterious rite, which originated in the dark 
ages, and may have been devised to check the 
intrusive ardour of vulgar aspirants to literature, is 
still solemnized under the significant, but imposing 
name of " grounding." The metaphor implies that 
the little slaves, chained to their oars, are com- 
pelled to pull hard, all day long, in shallow waters. 
Their boat is generally aground, but ever and anon 
they make a little headway. The wind and tide 
being always against them, their progress is slow, 
they often lose what they have gained, and take 
the ground again. If this goes on for a year or 
two, they are said to be thoroughly grounded. 
The ceremony is conducted with religious austerity 
and gravity, and the doctrine is inculcated that 
the depravity of human nature is so great, that 
without a careful study of grammar we cannot 
help using bad language. 

Book-grammar, however, is artificial, not natu- 
ral. Children in a state of freedom instinctively 
take the opposite course, pulling only as a recrea- 
tion, running rapidly before the wind and tide, with 
all sail set, and carefully eschewing the war of ele- 
ments in which the others are perpetually engaged. 

II. The second step is writing, which pre- 
cedes, because it includes, reading. 



78 



THE PROCESS. 



If the Rornan letters are employed, and if 
they are familiar to the learner, he may copy ten 
words of that sentence which he pronounces most 
correctly. He should write them in large round 
hand, over and over again, for a quarter of an 
hour. The memory is a deceiver, and therefore 
the learner should begin each sitting by copying 
the preceding lessons once, and then writing them 
again from recollection. 

It may be objected that ten words will call 
forth no exertion of the memory; but the design 
of all these restrictions is to employ that faculty 
so that its full power shall be employed in accom- 
plishing a very little, very perfectly. 

If an unknown character is employed, the 
writing may be commenced on the third day. 
The pupil should not learn more than three letters 
a day; he must not see any of the other letters, 
and he must not learn any of their names. He is 
to copy any one of the words which he knows, but 
nothing can be gained by talking about the letters, 
and therefore the alphabet is not required, and it 
ought not to be learned. 

The best plan is to trace the foreign characters 
on a gigantic scale, with the finger on the table. 
But if the pupil prefers making unsightly scrawls 
on paper, let him always destroy his performance 
as soon as he has finished it. 

He is never to begin a new lesson, unless he 



THE PROCESS. 



79 



can write out, promptly and faultlessly, every 
variation that can be made artificially out of the 
letters which he has already been taught. By 
moving forward deliberately, he will learn more 
rapidly, and much more thoroughly than those who 
grasp at the whole alphabet at once, thus doing 
that injustice to the memory which it is the special 
design of this system to prevent. 

In learning English no one should attempt to 
write, until he has "mastered" one hundred words. 
In French he should first " master " two hundred ; 
but he must not undertake more than five words at 
a time in either of those languages. 

While the writing is going on, another set of 
sentences, containing a hundred new words, is to 
be " mastered " in the same form. In these, the 
constructions omitted in the first set must be intro- 
duced, together with the rest of the prepositions, 
adverbs, &c, in most general use. Each of these 
sentences, in its turn, is to be worked into the 
former set by interchanges ; but without any alter- 
ations in the tenses and cases. 

In translating the variations of the English 
sentences into the foreign tongue, there must be 
no hesitation in the delivery ; but the learner must 
be prompted, whether he likes it or not, whenever 
a word does not come instantaneously to his lips. 

The accurate recollection of the sentences, both 
primary and secondary, will be a perfect safeguard 
against grammatical errors, and will afford a 



80 



THE PROCESS. 



guarantee for the correctness, and the idiomatic 
purity of these oral compositions. 

III. The manner in which the words of each 
sentence are capable of being transposed must now 
be exhibited, and explained to the learner; and he 
must practise translating, viva voce, the transposed 
English sentences. This will greatly enlarge and 
diversify his power of composition, while it affords 
him time to " master " the written characters. The 
object of reserving this exercise so long is to give 
the learner ample time to secure the recollection 
of the sentences in their original idiomatic form, 
before he breaks them up into new combinations. 

IV. He must next practise the composition of 
new varieties of the sentences, with the aid of a 
paradigm, or table of inflections, in order to 
acquire the power of using, with freedom, the 
whole of the tenses and cases belonging to those 
words which he has learned. 

The table is to be prepared so that the eye 
may command, at one view, the whole of the ter- 
minations of all the variable parts of speech. No 
new words are to be employed ; but the English 
sentences are to be thrown into different combina- 
tions, by changing one word at a time ; then two ; 
and then three. The object is to enable the 
learner to translate the altered sentences by word 
of mouth, with perfect accuracy, and more readily 



THE PROCESS. 81 

than he could do, if he were to trust to his 
memory. It is not a reasoning process that he 
has to perform, but a habit which he has to ac- 
quire in a quasi-mechanical manner. 

The labour and difficulty of speaking a language 
are in proportion to the number of items in this 
table, and to their irregularity ; but as, in highly- 
inflected languages, it is necessary to postpone the 
acquisition of many forms, the table may be so far 
reduced in its dimensions, as to present in the first 
instance one half, or one fourth, or even a smaller 
proportion of the variations of irregular parts of 
speech. By using this table the learner becomes 
practically familiarized with the terminations, far 
more effectually than he could be by going through 
the uninteresting labour, usually imposed upon 
beginners, of learning them by rote. But even 
though he may have committed them all carefully 
to memory, he must nevertheless make use of the 
table in the manner prescribed, and he must not 
advance to the next part of the process, till he 
finds that his memory outstrips his eye to such an 
extent, that he can employ all the most useful 
inflections with fluency, accuracy, and prompti- 
tude. 

Thus far extends the initiatory portion of the 
process, and here all restrictions cease. The learner 
may go abroad, and betake himself to books, 
and revel with impunity in the luxuries of the 

G 



82 



THE PROCESS. 



grammar and the dictionary. He may cram a great 
many words into his memory every day, and they 
will do him no harm. He may also read from 
morning till night. But if he wishes to make 
rapid progress in talking, he must practise oral 
composition for at least three half hours every day, 
although he cannot do it too often. 

If the learner, however, should come thus far, 
he will probably come farther, and adhere to the 
scheme throughout. 

V. Two whole days are now to be devoted 
to perusing a foreign book, or newspaper, with a 
translation ; not laboriously, nor even carefully, 
but rapidly and superficially. 

Two copies of the book or paper in each lan- 
guage being procured, the learner should read out 
a clause or a short sentence to a native, whose 
business it will be to read aloud in return the 
corresponding foreign words. The pupil is to 
follow the reader's course with the eye, and care- 
fully to echo the tones of his voice, not word by 
word, but clause by clause. 

The eye, the ear, and the vocal organs being 
thus intelligently exercised in unison, he becomes 
rapidly familiarized with the most common words, 
with the characters, with the various constructions, 
with the intonation, and with the true meaning 
of the sentences. 

This is incomparably the best way of learning 



THE PROCESS. 



83 



to read manuscripts, hieroglyphics, or any illegible 
scribblings, provided that it be done slowly, and 
with frequent reiterations during the first few 
lessons. 

Many words recur frequently in every page, 
and the most common idioms appear again and 
again ; and these, without any intellectual exertion 
being put forth, will fix themselves in the memory 
in a degree proportionate to the frequency of their 
recurrence. 

There must be no loitering to solve difficulties, 
or to make sure of remembering any particular 
words ; because this is intended to be a process of 
cursory observation, not of close study, — of habitua- 
tion, not of investigation,— of passive reception, 
not of active exercitation of the intellect. Obscure 
passages, however, should be marked with a pencil 
for ulterior reference, so that the learner may occa- 
sionally look back, and see that the difficulties have 
vanished behind him. 

The most practical sentences should be marked 
with a pencil during these readings, and the ground 
should be retrodden at the end of every half hour's 
work, in order that those sentences may be read 
very rapidly a second time ; and then a fresh 
start should be made. Each recapitulation should 
include the whole of the marked sentences. Occa- 
sionally the beginner should carry on the exercise 
without looking at the foreign book ; but this 



84 



THE PROCESS. 



should only be done for a short time, when the 
sentences are easy, or during the recapitulations 
aforesaid. 

On the morrow, let the work be resumed in 
similar form for one hour; and then let all the 
marked sentences be read aloud, clause by clause, 
in order that the beginner may echo them, and 
translate them off-hand into his own tongue. 

Next let some colloquial sentences be trans- 
lated briefly into English by the teacher, and then 
read by him at length in the original. These are 
to be echoed by the learner, to be re-translated 
literally into English, and then reproduced briefly 
and rapidly in the foreign language. 

During these operations the learner is not to 
play the critic, nor to put grammatical questions; 
nor is he to offer any opposition to that continual 
prompting, whereby his deliberations about each 
word must be cut short, and limited to five or six 
seconds. A sentence may be repeated to him, if he 
requires it, but no time can be spared for discussion 
or deliberation. If the obscure passages are 
marked with a pencil, they can be examined at 
leisure afterwards. 

Next let the prompter select and recite anec- 
dotes more or less briefly in English, and then read 
the original aloud, clause by clause, taking care 
to simplify the language when it is obscure, and 
to amplify it when it is concise. The learner 



THE PROCESS. 



85 



should translate some clauses, if he can, without 
looking at the book, but he must not loiter to 
cudgel his brains. 

Nothing should ever be read aloud to him, unless 
the purport of it has been previously mentioned. 

In this fifth part of the process, the prompter 
is not to guide and control the learner, but is to 
be quite under his command ; with this reservation 
alone, that whenever the learner falters, he must 
help him. There is to be no questioning, no 
lecturing, no teaching, no taxing of the memory, 
but every defect of knowledge or of memory is to 
be instantly supplied. The work is to be carried 
on with that urgency which is employed in 
cramming for some great examination, when there 
are only two or three days left, and every moment 
is precious. 

The reports of celebrated trials, in which the 
questions appear at full length, and in which the 
same story is told by several people in succession, 
each in his own phraseology, form the best mate- 
rials for these two days' labour; because the sen- 
tences are generally plain, practical, and of the 
proper length. 

As colloquial is very different from book -lan- 
guage, and the latter is a wretched substitute for 
it, narrative compositions, however elegant they 
may be, are unsuitable. A grand historic style is 
still more objectionable, and poetry is utterly 



86 



THE PROCESS. 



useless. A comedy will always afford good practice, 
but care should be taken to select the most useful 
passages, and to avoid unusual words, and unprac- 
tical sentences. 

During the first four stages, the pupil is sup- 
posed to have " mastered " two hundred of the 
words in most common use ; to be quite familiar 
with all the terminations of their tenses and cases ; 
and to have acquired a general insight into the 
structure of sentences. He is therefore in a posi- 
tion to encounter hundreds of new words, without 
being perplexed by them. 

This fifth part of the process is designed to 
show how the beginner may compress into a narrow 
compass that course of observation and habitua- 
tion, by means of which children, ten or twelve 
years old, when taken abroad, are enabled both to 
understand, and to talk a new language at the end 
of a few weeks; which a little child passes through 
very slowly, when struggling all alone to find what 
is imitable and practical in the conversation of his 
elders ; which every one who goes abroad to learn 
a language by mere listening, pursues tediously, 
unsatisfactorily, and unsystematically ; and which 
the youth of England slowly and imperfectly work 
out for themselves, by laboriously ploughing 
through books, with a grammar and a dictionary 
yoked together, in the vain hope of reaping what 
they do not sow. 



THE PROCESS. 



87 



The last labour under some disadvantages which 
this exercise will obviate. They suffer from encoun- 
tering, without due preparation, thousands of 
words, many of which are useless, and most of 
which are doomed to be either wholly or partially 
forgotten within three hours ; from neglecting oral 
composition ; from committing words, instead of 
sentences, to memory ; from studying a whole lan- 
guage at once, instead of gradually acquiring the 
power of using the most essential portion of it ; 
and from a severe and toilsome application, which, 
as respects the colloquial part, yields no definite 
practical equivalent for the expenditure of thought, 
of time, and of labour. 

In this cursory operation, the beginner will 
have sixteen hours of bookwork, with intervals of 
leisure equally distributed through the day. 

The virtue of this fifth part consists in its 
transporting the learner to a foreign atmosphere, 
amongst foreign sounds and idioms, for two whole 
days. It quickens his faculty of comprehending 
what he hears, by giving him successively in 
advance, the full literal translation of a clause, of 
a sentence, of a paragraph ; then a briefer transla- 
tion ; then a summary, and finally a mere clue. 

Although sustained attention is exacted, the 
intellectual exertion is very slight, the progress is 
graduated, and recapitulations intervene. 

It agrees with the course of nature, displayed 



88 



THE PROCESS. 



in the attainment of their own language by little 
children. The wonderment depicted in their faces, 
while they listen to some stirring tale that has 
been told a hundred times before, does not bespeak 
stupidity or failure of memory ; because any altera- 
tion in the dialogue, which to their minds is the 
most striking and practical part, always arrests 
their attention, and they instantly supply the 
original words. But it indicates a keen obser- 
vation and appreciation of the marvellous and 
magical variety of that word-painting, which they 
would not be able to understand, but for their 
previous familiarity with the incidents. It is by 
telling such stories to other children, with a little 
aid at first from their parents, that a command of 
words, a power of graphic description, and even a 
strain of eloquence, are sometimes attained in very 
early life. And it is by assiduous practice, with a 
small stock of words, in a very small range of 
thought, that adults obtain the free use and com- 
mand of a foreign language. 

VI. The learner's next step is to take up an 
interesting book in his own language, to select 
therefrom sentences containing words with which 
he is familiar in the foreign tongue; to shorten 
long periods ; to amplify single clauses into com- 
plete sentences, and one by one to translate them. 

Easy sentences are not to be despised. In 
those which are so complicated that he cannot 



THE PROCESS. 



89 



rapidly reduce them, it will be enough to arrange 
the words in the order which the foreign idiom 
requires. He should also construct out of the 
materials before him some imperative and interro- 
gative sentences of ten or twelve words each, 
increasing the length by degrees, translating them 
as he goes along, marking the best of them in the 
margin, and occasionally recapitulating them. The 
learner is not to bind himself rigidly to the words 
which he finds in the book, because this would 
effectually check the freedom which he is striving 
to gain in the construction of complete sentences. 
He may insert other words at pleasure. 

The object of this exercise is not to teach him 
new words, but to impart fluency and prompti- 
tude in making use of those words and phrases 
which he has learned, and in throwing them into 
colloquial sentences containing conjunctions, inter- 
rogative adverbs, pronouns, and prepositions. These 
translations are never to be written. The power 
of expressing the ideas of an author in different 
words, whether it be done by amplification, by 
circumlocution, or by simplification, should be 
carefully cultivated, in order that when the learner 
engages in conversation, he may be able with 
promptitude to escape from a difficulty by making 
a total change in the form of the sentence which he 
wishes to deliver. This constitutes the speciality 
of the accomplished linguist. 



90 



THE PROCESS. 



A dictionary causes grievous interruption to 
the trains of thought, besides involving loss of 
time, uncertainty, misdirection, and confusion. It 
is a chaos of words to a beginner, and it ought 
never to be resorted to when a native is at hand, 
or when a translation is available. 

When the learner finds a noun or a verb 
which he does not know how to translate, he 
should either ask for the foreign word before he 
begins, or, if he is practising alone, he should 
substitute another one for it, always selecting for 
this purpose some particularly useful verbs and 
nouns (two of each), using them through the 
whole sitting, and thus impressing them on his 
memory. His progress in wielding those words 
which he knows ought never to be interrupted by 
his ignorance of individual words casually encoun- 
tered. Time given to deliberation is wasted, and 
there is no merit in producing a word long after it 
is wanted. Promptitude is the great object, com- 
bined, of course, with accuracy. 

If he takes up the translation of a foreign 
work for this exercise, his composition is on no 
account to be compared with the original, to see 
whether it corresponds or not. If he gives a 
correct translation, it is enough. No man of 
ordinary memory can recite an anecdote, even in 
his own language, in the exact words in which he 
casually heard, or read it, half an hour before. 



THE PROCESS. 



9L 



Out of a thousand listeners, no two would give 
similarly worded versions of a story occupying half 
an octavo page. To exact a precise counterpart 
of the original text of any book from a foreigner, 
more especially from one who has not attempted to 
commit it to memory, and most especially from one 
who has never seen the work, is preposterous. 

Nothing can be more disheartening to a begin- 
ner, than to be checked at every second or third 
word, by cries of No, No, No, from a pedagogue, 
looking at the original work, and indulging in the 
insane expectation of hearing the exact words of 
the author. This gross and stolid misconception 
has probably conduced to the discontinuance of 
Roger Ascham's method of double translations, 
which is of great value at the proper time, and 
under proper limitation. 

If Queen Elizabeth, of glorious memory, had 
submitted to be thus snubbed at the outset of her 
classical career, she never would have risen to the 
pre-eminence which she attained under Roger's 
guidance. It was only at the very close of a long 
course of study, that she acquired the power of 
putting her own translations of Cicero and Demos- 
thenes into the oratorical diction for which she 
ultimately became so renowned. And even then 
she attained it only by close study, as a preparation 
for each effort. 

Self-snubbing, on the odious principle above 



92 



THE PROCESS. 



described, is extensively practised by tourists, who 
may be seen in picturesque localities, with one 
column of a dialogue book conscientiously folded 
back, while they are saying their appointed task. 
Now the idea of a rigorous ordeal is excellent, and 
the acquisition of useful ready-made sentences is 
beyond all praise. But yet the success is very 
small, because they try to swallow a whole page at 
one mouthful, instead of a single sentence, and 
because the eye roams unrestrained through the 
volume, and thus the memory is either choked or 
surfeited. 

This sixth exercise is an extension of the fourth 
part of the process, and therefore the synopsis is to 
be freely used, in order to lighten the labour, and 
to remedy all defects of accuracy and fluency. It 
should be practised with recapitulations every day, 
in preference to any other exercise, or even to the 
exclusion of every thing else. 

VII. The next step in the scheme is to asso- 
ciate with foreigners, to familiarize the ear to the 
tones of their voices. 

No one should listen to conversation until 
he has " mastered" a few sentences containing 
about two hundred of the most common words. 
He will find difficulty enough in recognizing 
those which he knows, when he first hears them 
uttered by strange voices in strange and unex- 
pected combinations; and of course new phrases, 



THE PROCESS. 



93 



containing new words, will be unintelligible to him. 
He must learn to express his own thoughts, before 
he can expect to converse. 

He should always obtain, if possible, a clue to 
the conversation, because without this an active 
mind is sure to receive wrong impressions. It is 
useful to frequent public places as a listener; to 
ask several people in succession for the news of 
the day, after having carefully read it all before- 
hand; to hear the Church Service, or any well 
known book, read aloud; but especially to engage 
strangers in conversation on subjects which he has 
previously discussed with others, in order that he 
may repeat his own questions and observations, 
with additions and improvements. These second- 
hand conversations are by far the most instructive. 

It is true that very animated gesticulations 
will often enable us to conjecture what two 
foreigners are saying, even when they are out of 
earshot, but this is an exercise of our natural 
sagacity, not of our knowledge of the language; 
and as we all possessed it in infancy, and as we 
never lose it entirely in after life, there is no 
danger to be apprehended from keeping it in 
reserve for a few weeks. 

As the true sounds of a foreign sentence can- 
not be retained by a beginner, unless he listens to 
them undisturbedly, and hears them uttered two 
or three times at least, he can do himself very little 



94 



THE PROCESS. 



good by suddenly exposing himself, without any 
training, to a Babel of words. And unless he 
repeats and imitates what he hears, he may listen 
for a long time without deriving any benefit 
from it. 

It is not to be denied that people do learn to 
speak a language, even under the most unfavour- 
able circumstances; but as they have no system, 
and as they cannot explain how they do it, it may 
be confidently assumed that they apply themselves, 
like children, unconsciously, to the imitation and 
repetition of sentences; and that their success 
depends entirely on the suitability of what they 
learn by chance. 

So also, without previously learning the letters, 
people may acquire the power of reading a foreign 
language, if with a book open before them, they 
carefully follow with their eyes, the course of a 
person reading aloud to them, as slowly as they 
require. Many children learn to read their own 
language in this manner, without spelling, and it 
is by far the best method, because children so 
taught, generally learn orthography more rapidly 
than others. 

On the other hand, there are not a few. men, 
who find themselves quite helpless when travelling 
in France, although they can read a French novel 
as easily as one in their own language ; and can 
understand a great deal of what they hear spoken. 



THE PROCESS. 



95 



They cannot put their words into sentences, 
because they are not in possession of any sentences 
to put them into ; nor have they ever given up 
one whole day to making attempts at talking; nor 
have they persevered in systematic oral composi- 
tion, by translating dialogues, or making imaginary 
conversations even for a few minutes a day; but 
they console themselves with the reflection, that 
their book-knowledge is the greatest, and most 
useful attainment, and that after all " any noodle 
can talk if he tries. " 

This is a fact not to be denied, nor even 
questioned for a moment; but yet the excuse is a 
very contemptible one ; because in reality they do 
not know how to try, and they are conscious that 
this is the cause of their own delinquency. To 
try without some definite plan, which will afford 
them a rational expectation of success, is repug- 
nant to their feelings, and therefore they will not 
try. 

When he first attempts to talk, an English- 
man feels and looks very like a school-boy who 
is saying a lesson, keenly watched by others who 
are intent on detecting flaws in his compositions. 
And as many intelligent men acknowledge that 
they have blundered into a colloquial knowledge, 
and as they urge others to begin in the same way, 
he seriously inclines to their strongly-expressed 
opinion that it is the only possible way. But this 



9fi 



THE PROCESS. 



wilful premeditated blundering, this barbarous 
massacre of a language in cold blood, is an outrage 
to all his scholarly feelings. He shrinks from 
talking till circumstances force him into it, and 
then he bitterly repents that he had not initiated 
himself before. 

It vexes him to hear educated men setting 
grammar, idiom, and pronunciation at defiance; 
but he is not sure that he can acquit himself much 
better. Nor does he like to expose himself to the 
scoffs of those who pretend to know more than he 
does, and yet will not attempt to speak, lest they 
should commit themselves. 

We often hear a man who is invited to act as 
interpreter to a party, decline the honour, on the 
plea that "he would rather not make a fool of 
himself." If he happens to be a man of reputed 
ability, it requires some hardihood in a beginner 
to attempt to perform the office from which the 
former shrinks. It shocks him to find that all his 
classical training is utterly worthless in a practical 
point of view, and it irritates him to hear that he 
can only blunder into correctness by ridiculous 
guesses. This violation of all his feelings, and this 
apprehension that he is exposing himself to ridi- 
cule, cause him to appear to great disadvantage in 
the eyes of foreigners. 

He has never been told that each day should 
have its definite lesson in the form of a colloquial 



THE PROCESS. 



97 



sentence, and that he may learn it to perfection 
before he uses it in public. His school traditions 
lead him to suppose that he can manufacture 
foreign sentences for himself, and he thinks it 
childish and shabby to learn them ready-made. 

He does not know that the benefit derived 
from hearing a foreigner speak to him, is as nothing 
when compared with that which results from his 
own efforts to carry on the conversation ; and the 
idea has never occurred to him that he may prac- 
tise this in solitude far better than with a pedantic 
teacher, or a voluble stranger, who forces him 
to speak on unfamiliar subjects, and who hurries, 
interrupts, puzzles, thwarts, and disappoints him, 
in the most amiable and courteous manner. 

The colloquial power is often decried as an 
acquisition of little merit ; but on examination it 
will be found to be more difficult than descriptive 
composition, because a greater variety of construc- 
tions is required, together with a peculiar phraseo- 
logy. It also exacts a thorough command over the 
whole of the pronouns, and a practical knowledge 
of the terminations of verbs, greater in the ratio of 
at least two to one. 

Eeading, it is true, imparts an acquaintance 
with ten times as many words ; but it does not 
insure that " mastery" which we require. 

To a traveller, the colloquial is unquestionably 
the more useful acquisition, because a man who 

H 



98 



THE PROCESS. 



is able to talk, though he does not know a single 
letter of the foreign character, can, on an emer- 
gency, dictate to an amanuensis ; and though he 
cannot read, he can understand what is read to 
him, and if he mistrusts one reader, he can employ 
another. 

Again, the colloquial power is the more valuable 
at first, because they who possess it can learn to 
read much more easily than those who know nothing 
of the language ; and in the matter of letter writing, 
if they can express themselves correctly by word 
of mouth when dictating to another, they will com- 
pose in a superior manner during the more delibe- 
rate process of writing. 

But here we encounter the great scarecrow 
orthography, which in English and French, and 
some few other languages, presents difficulties that 
can only be slowly overcome by steady and system- 
atic application. 

Foreigners must bear in mind that accuracy in 
spelling depends entirely on careful ocular observa- 
tion, and that analogy is a treacherous guide that 
can never be depended upon. 

When the beginner can spell his two hundred 
English words correctly, he must practise writing 
them every day with new words interspersed. 
When he has advanced as far as five hundred, he 
may copy out poetry with advantage. Let him 
examine the spelling of a line of very short metre 



V 



THE PROCESS. 99 

four times over, and after this slight exercise 
of the attention and the memory, let him trans- 
cribe it. 

The special object of this is to accustom the 
eye to exercise minute observation. It should not 
be allowed to wander to any other part of the page. 
A regular metre is recommended, in order that 
each act of the memory may be as nearly uniform 
as possible. Close attention must be given to the 
work as long as it lasts, and each sitting should be 
rigorously limited to fifteen minutes ; but the 
beginner, if so disposed, may practise again and 
again at intervals of at least one hour. 

The copy-book ought to be kept absolutely free 
from the blemish of a mis-spelt word. If three or 
four mistakes occur in one sitting, a shorter metre 
should be transcribed. As in talking, fluency and 
precision are exacted, though not without abundant 
consideration before-hand, so in writing, every line 
is to be copied after deliberate ocular examination. 

If the spelling of a word happens to be for- 
gotten, it should not be guessed at, but omitted. 
This rule ought to be inviolably observed at every 
stage of progress. When a word has been omitted, 
the whole line in which the blank occurs should be 
written over again at the end of the page, and 
once more at the end of the two next exercises. 

Words that have been either mis-spelt or obli- 
terated, should be gibbeted in large round text and 



100 



THE PROCESS. 



hung up, in their correct orthography, in front 
of the beginner's customary seat. But omissions 
should be regarded as praiseworthy, rather than 
blameable. 

Whenever the copy-book remains unblemished 
during eight consecutive sittings, a longer metre 
may be adopted, but not more than two syllables 
should be added at each step in advance. Progress 
ought to be made slowly, and no change in the 
metre should be allowed until the stipulated con- 
ditions have been strictly fulfilled, and confirmed 
by the test of dictation. 

Dictation should be resorted to about twice a 
week, but it should be limited to the words already 
learned, and it should always be commenced with- 
out any warning. The gibbeted words should be 
called for, and gradually removed as the learner 
shows that he has " mastered " them. When a 
word is asked for, the whole line should be read 
aloud, but only that one word should be written. 

Dictation, as generally conducted, is often pro- 
ductive of more harm than good, because it is 
carried far beyond reasonable limits. The exercise 
ought to cease when a certain number of words 
have been mis-spelt, and time ought not to be 
wasted in useless and wearisome transcriptions of 
the commonest words over and over again. 

As this exercise requires lively attention, 
humorous or interesting books alone ought to be 



THE PROCESS. 



101 



employed. When passages are read aloud relating 
to subjects of no interest, selected out of books 
which the beginner has never seen, they discourage 
him, because he is conscious that he must of neces- 
sity commit numerous errors. Such a severe pro- 
cess is only fit for competitive examinations, and 
even then it is extremely uncertain. It is far 
better that a beginner should receive daily encou- 
ragement for the small successes which he achieves, 
than that he should be annoyed and disheartened 
by committing unavoidable mistakes, and by having 
his ignorance exposed at every sitting. 

A clear line should be drawn, if possible, 
between the known and the unknown words. The 
former class will include only those, in the writing 
of which it has been ascertained by dictation that 
the learner has never made a mistake. 

The oftener the copy book is looked at for the 
purpose of self-examination, the better. 

This process being almost mechanical, clever 
people must not promise themselves greater success 
in spelling than their neighbours attain. The 
work may seem endless, but that is no reason for 
indiscriminately grappling with hundreds of diffi- 
culties all at once. In this, as in every other 
pursuit involving numerous minutiee, method is 
essential to sound progress. 

The learner should practise letter-writing for 
half an hour every day, taking care to restrict 



102 



THE PROCESS. 



himself to those words which he uses in talking ; 
for although they form but a small portion of the 
language, he will not require many more, and he 
will always be safe within his own domain. The 
attainment of four thousand words can only be 
completed by slow degrees, and the words which 
are most wanted, ought to be learned first. 

Reading, though it be carried on for several 
hours a day, is of little use in imparting a know- 
ledge of orthography, except when it is attended 
with close observation, exercised specially upon a 
very few words. 

Nor will reading keep up our colloquial power 
over a language, although we commence the prac- 
tice on the very day on which we cease to speak it, 
and to hear it spoken. Nor will reading, even 
when supported by close analytical study, restore 
the colloquial power which has been long out of 
use. In fact, it confers no more benefit in this 
respect, than listening inertly to the conversation 
of foreigners, does in respect to the colloquial 
power. The practice of reading aloud is said to 
be beneficial, but it cannot be relied upon, because 
there is no active exercise of the memory involved 
in it. 

But if there be a daily exercise of oral compo- 
sition, with a stock of well-chosen sentences, 
learned thoroughly, and a synoptical table of 
the cases and tenses of the nouns and verbs in 



THE PROCESS. 



103 



constant use, reading, study, and critical discus- 
sion are alike unnecessary for the restoration and 
recovery even of a long-forgotten language; and 
therefore it is better to dispense with them alto- 
gether, until that short and simple process shall 
have been completed. 

But even when it has been honestly gone 
through, the tenses are very apt to escape from the 
memory ; and therefore those who are in earnest 
should always carry about with them a reduced 
synopsis, containing those parts of the verb which, 
in practice, they find that they are prone either to 
forget, or to misapply. 



CHAPTER VI. 



ON THE SELECTION OF SENTENCES. 

rPHERE is nothing which, strictly speaking, can 
be called the beginning of a language. It 
is a globe, the geography of which commences 
anywhere. 

There is no construction, no form of thought, 
no question, no command, no part of speech, which 
can rightfully claim priority. Utility is the only 
consideration in the choice of the first sentences. 

As every written word consists of letters 
arranged in a certain established, inviolable order, 
so every sentence of a new language must be 
regarded as an indivisible, inseparable combination, 
until the memory has grasped it securely. 

The selection of certain words for the first sen- 
tence may be termed arbitrary, but it no more 
interferes with their ulterior employment, in what- 
ever other positions they may be required, than 



106 



ON THE SELECTION OF SENTENCES. 



the adoption of certain letters for writing a word, 
prevents their introduction into other words. 

When we begin by dismembering sentences, 
and reducing them to their elements, as exhi- 
bited in a grammar, before we have learned them 
perfectly, we are unable to reproduce them in their 
original form, because a state of confusion has been 
. created in the brain, not unlike that which is expe- 
rienced by a novice in playing at chess. If, after 
ransacking our brains, we can slowly recall the 
words, our teachers are satisfied, even although we 
cannot replace them in their original order. But 
we must not be so easily satisfied; because the true 
collocation of the words is of infinitely greater 
importance than any thing else; and there can be 
no hardship in exacting it rigorously from those 
who have only to learn a very few words at a time, 
and who may therefore reasonably be expected to 
reproduce them with the utmost fluency, in their 
proper order. 

The colloquial acquisition of a language does 
not require a command over the whole dictionary; 
for such a power is absolutely unattainable, even 
by lexicographers ; but it implies the " mastery " 
over the whole range of very common words. 

Our preparatory training generally exacts an 
acquaintance with the whole of the syntactical 
combinations, and of all the cases and tenses of all 
those declinable words, which are most frequently 



ON THE SELECTION OF SENTENCES. 107 

used, whether regular or irregular. This is useful 
knowledge for those who are to begin with books, 
and to whom the recognition of words, and their 
terminations, is all-important ; but it is an impedi- 
ment to those from whom the reproduction of 
words in their appointed places is exacted as the 
chief consideration. 

It is a mistake to begin by learning by rote 
all the cases and tenses of all the declinable 
words. Teachers recommend this course, because 
of the extreme difficulty of using them, but it is on 
this very ground that it is objectionable. When 
we have learned them thoroughly, we are supposed 
to have gained the power of using them ; but this 
is a fiction, which is exposed the moment we 
attempt oral composition. 

Every well-chosen sentence that we " master" 
in its integrity, puts us into possession of some of 
those items which are exhibited in grammars, and 
thus we may gradually learn the whole of them. 
But those items which we learn first cannot be 
distinctly and practically retained, unless we can 
employ them with perfect freedom ; nor will the 
genuine construction and collocation remain durably 
in the memory, unless recapitulation and imitative 
oral composition on a limited scale are practised 
every day. By not complying with these con- 
ditions, and by shackling ourselves with super- 
fluous formalities, we retard our progress; and the 



108 ON THE SELECTION OF SENTENCES. 

incessant repetition of the non-essential, affords 
no compensation for the non-repetition of the 
essential. 

It is a well-known fact that boys, who have 
learned to converse fluently on their travels abroad, 
and are under orders to keep up their know- 
ledge of the foreign language at an English school, 
very frequently return to their agonized parents 
in the holidays, speaking spurious French or 
German, instead of the genuine idiomatic forms of 
expression, which were habitual to them before. 
The grammar and exercise system, which thus 
obliterates and eradicates a vernacular knowledge 
of a language, and substitutes translated English 
phrases, must be essentially anti-vernacular, or else 
we must conclude that it has been grossly mis- 
understood, and misapplied. 

Many writers have remarked, that all the 
constructions of a language may generally be 
found in a few pages of any book ; or even within 
the limits of one page. But they parade the fact 
without making the right use of it. They do not 
venture to draw the legitimate and obvious con- 
clusion, that within that small compass we may 
acquire a knowledge of all the constructions. 
Neither do they venture to exhibit one such page 
as a specimen ; nor do they show us practically how 
we may utilize the fact which they proclaim. 

In what manner a language may be condensed 



ON THE SELECTION OF SENTENCES. 109 

into one page, so far as the regular constructions 
are concerned, may be inferred from inspecting the 
concise syntax of our own tongue, in the folio 
edition of Johnson's Dictionary. That high au- 
thority gives only five rules, the whole of which 
may be exemplified in a sentence of eight words. 
In like manner every grammarian lays down, 
according to his. own views of the language of 
which he treats, a set of rules, the most essential 
of which may be exhibited in a few sentences. 
The most copious syntax may thus be reduced to a 
small compass, as may be proved by observing 
how many Latin rules must be complied with in 
translating English sentences extending to the 
length of five lines of print. 

This principle of condensation must be applied 
in the preparation of sentences for beginners. The 
foreign language ought to be presented to the 
learner in such a manner as to show him, in the 
primary sentences, the most striking contrasts to 
the constructions of his own tongue, in order to 
accustom him, from the outset, to employ forms of 
expression which are quite at variance with his 
habits of thought. A thorough adaptation of two 
languages to each other, demands the hand of an 
expert in both ; but very little learning and skill 
are required for the compression, into a few 
sentences, of all the peculiar syntactical con- 
structions. 



110 ON THE SELECTION OF SENTENCES. 



The greatest successes ever obtained by lin- 
guists have, in all probability, been due to the com- 
pactness of the form in which they " mastered " 
the constructions, embodied in sentences of the 
most practical description. But there is no neces- 
sity for compressing them into a smaller compass 
than a set of sentences, containing one hundred 
words. 

The danger against which every learner has to 
be especially protected, is the tendency to translate 
his own thoughts, word for word. There are some 
languages in which every sentence so constructed, 
must be wrong, although it may be grammatically 
correct. Here is the vulnerable point of those 
methods in which grammar is held to be the one 
essential. 

A beginner cannot arrange words in combina- 
tions to which he is practically a stranger; but 
if he learns by rote a comprehensive set of idio- 
matic sentences, and naturalizes all the words by 
diligent practice, restricted rigorously to that 
selection, he is in actual possession of all the con- 
structions, although he has never seen or heard of 
a syntax. 

The course of nature combines analysis and 
synthesis, with a practical knowledge of all the 
constructions, and with a mere sufficiency, instead 
of a superabundance of words. Idiomatic sen- 
tences become fixtures in the memory, and the 



ON THE SELECTION OF SENTENCES. 



Ill 



analysis of them is so simple, that it is easily per- 
formed even by young children. The latter have 
not, and they do not require that critical power, 
which educated men display in their investigations 
into the component parts of a new language, and 
the peculiar constructions thereof. The process 
is altogether different, and the soundness of the 
principle is obvious. For sentences learned 
by rote gradually dissolve themselves, and be- 
come decomposed, when the words are severally 
used in other combinations, in the hearing of 
the child. 

Thus, if he has learned the following five sylla- 
bles, " Give me some of that," which to him are 
but one word or utterance, indivisible in the first 
instance, his attention is attracted by any portions 
of it, which he may chance to hear afterwards 
applied in a different manner, as " Give me that;" 
" I want some of that," &c. He observes those 
variations; and by degrees he comprehends them, 
and employs them himself, not in supersession of 
the original sentence, but in addition to it. In 
this manner the analysis becomes, for all practical 
purposes, complete ; and the meaning of the whole 
sentence becomes more and more clearly under- 
stood. He cannot be said to understand each of 
the words thoroughly, but he uses them intelli- 
gently and accurately. He cannot assign a score 
of meanings to the preposition "of," but his 



112 ON THE SELECTION OF SENTENCES. 



ignorance is not inexcusable, and it is no bar to 
his progress. 

Such is the analysis of nature, resulting from a 
series of observations and inferences, drawn by 
infants from the known to the unknown; from the 
whole to its parts. 

The synthetic operation is merely the insertion 
of other words, one by one, into their appropriate 
niches in the sentences learned by rote. Each new 
word corresponds grammatically with that which it 
displaces. Thus, in the sentence above given, 
he may introduce "him" instead of "me," and 
" those" instead of "that." The substitution of 
the right word, in the right form, without any 
knowledge of grammar, results from that instinct 
of imitation and repetition, which operates univer- 
sally in the unsophisticated minds of children. 

The intellectual power exercised in these opera- 
tions is so trifling, that they scarcely deserve to 
be called reasoning processes. And yet, if a man 
attempts oral composition before he is possessed of 
a stock of words engraved on his memory in purely 
idiomatic combinations, all the words, cases, tenses, 
and rules which his memory has retained in- 
coherently, all his critical knowledge of the 
language, and all his intellectual power seem to 
be of no avail. He does not express himself idio- 
matically, because he has not the tools wherewith 
to perform the synthetical operation. 



ON THE SELECTION OF SENTENCES. 113 

It is not enough, however, merely to obtain 
possession of the tools ; but the dexterity of the 
skilled workman must be superadded by assiduous 
practice in using them. To stop short of this, is 
to render all the previous acquisitions lifeless and 
nugatory. 

The combination of analysis and synthesis, in 
the child's process, is not due to any sudden deve- 
lopment of his intellectual faculties ; but there is 
an unwritten law of which he seems to have an 
intuitive perception. It is that essence of language 
which the subtle genius of the inventor of grammar 
discerned, which with infinite difficulty he ex- 
pressed in hard words, and in an. evil hour shaped 
into a system and a science. 

How to separate grammar from its technicali- 
ties, and explain the constructions of a language 
in simple, intelligible terms, is a problem which 
seems to have escaped attention, or to have 
baffled inquiry. The general impression is that 
grammar is inseparable and impalpable, but it 
does not necessarily follow that it is incom- 
municable ; for it is an ingredient or property of 
language, and there is no necessity for abstracting 
it. It is inherent in every sentence of every lan- 
guage, and therefore those who "master" a com- 
plete set of sentences are in full possession of it in 
its concrete form, if such a term may be applied. 
When we deal with it in the abstract, it is highly 

I 



114 ON THE SELECTION OF SENTENCES. 

metaphysical and abstruse, and it is therefore a 
most unsuitable training for the colloquial acquisi- 
tion of a language. 

Children taken abroad have better success, 
under the unwritten law, than we obtain from 
grammar. They reproduce sentences uttered by 
foreigners, while our only resource is to trans- 
late our own forms of speech, and to reason, where 
translation misleads us, and reasoning is out of 
place. The unwritten law guides children aright, 
and it will, undoubtedly, be equally true to us, 
unless we counteract it by some antagonistic course 
of procedure. 

In the child's method, the ideal syntax comes 
first, in company with some of the rudiments and 
elements. The rest gradually follow, mingled with 
other combinations. Whenever he speaks correctly, 
we say that he obeys the rule of syntax, or the law 
of the language. But he obeys it unwittingly, for 
the rules have never been given to him; he has 
not invented them, he does not require them, and 
if they were communicated to him he could not 
possibly understand them. Nature imparts to him 
the whole essence of the language, embodied in 
those sentences which he learns by rote — the gas 
with the coal. We spend months in laboriously 
and needlessly extracting the gas. We smother 
the fire of memory with masses of coke; but he 
feeds it with the genuine fuel so frequently and so 



ON THE SELECTION OF SENTENCES. 115 



lightly that it is always blazing, crackling, and 
sparkling. 

The strict meaning of the words " elements " 
and "rudiments,"" is not very obvious. The former 
term includes, perhaps, every original word which 
cannot be decomposed, and every syllable or letter 
which, though inseparable, has an etymological 
significance of its own. 

Eudiments are variously defined as " elements," 
or "ingredients," or the "first parts of education," 
or " rude, unfinished portions," or " inaccurate, 
unshapen beginnings." Such definitions are not 
very instructive. But elements are unquestionably 
included in rudiments; and these are unfinished, 
inaccurate, unshapen fragments, as compared with 
sentences or periods, which, being complete, hold a 
much higher position in the eyes of grammarians. 
"John walks;"— "It rains;"— " Milk is white;" 
are pithy propositions which are given to explain 
to us what periods are. Unfortunately these are 
supposed to be models, because they are styled 
complete ; and as there is also safety in small 
efforts at composition, a passion for very concise 
forms of speech prevails among beginners. As it 
is impossible, however, to sustain a cheerful con- 
versation on such terms, nature rebels against this 
limitation. Such little propositions are nothing 
more than rudiments of language; and although 
they are also entitled to the more dignified 



116 ON THE SELECTION OF SENTENCES. 



appellation of sentences, or periods, they only fetter 
the beginner by restricting him to very incomplete 
utterances. 

A sounder, because more practical, view of the 
nature of rudiments is suggested by the Hebrew 
orthography, wherein one word often comprises 
three, and sometimes four or five of ours. The 
following sentence, when written in Hebrew, would 
contain only seven words, according to the divi- 
sions marked : 

And he sent me | to your territory | with his wife | 
and her brothers | to save them | from their enemies | 
who were pursuing* them. 

Each of these clauses is a rudiment, being an 
unfinished portion of a sentence. It is true they 
are neither unshapen nor inaccurate, and therefore 
they do not harmonize with the definition, but 
this will be no disadvantage to the beginner. 
Although they are not periods, they are integral 
portions of them, and therefore they are equally 
essential to learners. Moreover, they become com- 
plete propositions by implication whenever they 
are employed as answers to questions. 

The beginner should, therefore, learn similar 
combinations, linked together in circumstantial 
sentences, not selecting them with a view to 
attaining the colloquial power with extreme rapi- 
dity, but with the more sober consideration that 



ON THE SELECTION OF SENTENCES. 117 

his progress must be gradually progressive. The 
combination of nouns with possessive pronouns and 
prepositions will be found extremely useful, because 
they may be introduced into almost every sentence 
that a beginner addresses to foreigners; and in 
most languages it requires a good deal of practice 
to transpose and interchange those words. In 
English alone there is no difficulty in using them. 

There are other considerations which recom- 
mend these rudimentary forms. Sentences in all 
languages naturally resolve themselves into such 
clauses, and in point of length they are on a par 
with those periods which are usually presented in 
books for beginners. Moreover, one clause suffices 
for a lesson ; the time occupied in its utterance is 
only two or three seconds, and the number of times 
that it can be recalled in thought during five 
minutes is almost incalculable. 

People studying languages abroad are not 
aware how much their progress is due to their 
unconscious recitations of such clauses, which they 
revolve so often in a few seconds, that they make a 
deep impression upon the memory. So long as 
beginners lie in wait to seize upon disconnected 
individual words, they make no progress, because 
they disregard every little combination which they 
thoroughly understand. They feel that they have 
done it, and have passed beyond it, and therefore 
they pay no heed to it. Forgetting that language 



118 ON THE SELECTION OF SENTENCES. 



is only a series of combinations, they go all wrong. 
But when they are off their guard, and cease from 
thwarting the operations of nature, she always re- 
asserts her power, and they become the unconscious 
recipients of valuable additions to their stock of 
combinations, without any spontaneous exertion of 
the intellect. Whenever the learner leads a con- 
versation, he benefits by receiving rudimentary 
answers. But when he imagines that it is out of 
his power to lead, when he restricts himself to yes 
and no, he subjects himself inevitably to become 
a mere listener, to hear long sentences without 
having any clue to the meaning, and thus to forego 
the twofold advantage of practising oral compo- 
sition and of receiving short answers, the nature of 
which he can anticipate so far that he can readily 
comprehend them.. 

It is difficult in the extreme to frame a set of 
sentences that will satisfy anybody, and impossible 
to produce one that will satisfy everybody. But 
as every Englishman is by education a critic, a 
selection is offered under the conviction that, 
however unsuitable they may seem to be, they will 
at least be suggestive, and with the proviso that 
they shall every one of them be remodelled 
according to the learner's own taste. He may 
eject any noun or verb, with or without reason, 
and substitute another which he likes better, or 



ON THE SELECTION OF SENTENCES. 119 

which he thinks more suited to his own especial 
requirements. But the sentences must not be 
shortened, because it is by extending their 
range that we obtain the most useful models, 
together with greater accuracy and command of 
language. 

It is in vain for a beginner to expect, in the 
first few days, to learn a large number of words, 
and to acquire also the power of using them. 

Servants and tradesmen, who have to prepare 
themselves for a special and well-defined narrow 
sphere, are generally more successful at first than 
educated men. The latter are too ambitious by 
far. In their efforts to speak a whole language 
with freedom and purity all at once, they are 
aspiring to an accomplishment which is seldom 
attained, except by thoroughly educated natives ; 
and they also attempt it on wrong principles. The 
superfluity of words is sufficient of itself to paralyse 
them. Every word that they hear or see is a 
straw, the weight of which, individually, is as 
nothing, yet the whole bundle is too great for the 
strongest memory. 

Those who have only to speak to one foreigner, 
on one subject, are in the most advantageous 
position, because they can easily anticipate their 
own wants, and draw up a set of sentences which 
they must use, or may use, several times every 
day. This compulsory repetition of the sentences 



120 ON THE SELECTION OF SENTENCES. 



which have been committed to memory, is in- 
valuable. 

Some definite limitation of the sphere of con- 
versation is essential. There need be no apprehen- 
sion about its being too contracted, because there 
is no pursuit in which the range of expression is 
not wide enough to include the whole of the con- 
structions, and to afford opportunities for the 
employment of every case and tense of the nouns, 
pronouns, and verbs. It is not extensive know- 
ledge that is required, but readiness in using 
what we already possess; not power, but rather 
dexterity. There is less merit in speaking well, 
after a long and laborious course of study, than in 
doing so with little or no training; and there is 
more cleverness in making two hundred words 
subserve all the purposes of life, than in employing 
the whole dictionary. 

In the selection and formation of sentences 
for a beginner, each of them should contain about 
twenty words. 

The best sentences and words are those which 
the individual learner will have most occasion to 
employ in his first intercourse with foreigners. 

Interrogative sentences are most required. 

Negative questions are valuable, because they 
generally comprise the affirmative form of expres- 
sion. 

A beginner must not aim at brevity. 



ON THE SELECTION OF SENTENCES. 121 

Circumstantiality is of infinitely greater value than 
conciseness. Brevity and strength of expression 
are excellent in those who have attained a high 
degree of proficiency; but intelligibility, and a 
free command of words must first be attained. 

Complicated sentences are on no account to be 
avoided, or postponed ; they are more instructive 
than simple ones. 

Sentences, wherein the words correspond with 
the order of arrangement in the learner's ver- 
nacular tongue, must not on any account be pre- 
sented to him at first. The preference should be 
given to those in which the order is most inverted. 

Antithetical sentences are good, because they 
give scope for the introduction of conjunctions ; but 
it should be remembered that two short sentences 
coupled together, are only short sentences after all. 

It is better to learn a comprehensive sentence, 
which grasps within itself the substance of six 
other forms of speech, than to obtain six methods 
of expressing one idea. 

Those e very-day expressions in the learner's 
own language, which cannot be represented except 
by special idioms in the foreign tongue, ought to 
be provided for among the first. 

Individual words are not to be excluded from a 
new sentence because they have previously occurred. 
Such repetition is unavoidable, and, as it facilitates 
the work, it is unobjectionable. 



122 ON THE SELECTION OF SENTENCES. 

Strictly synonymous words are to be avoided. 

Words of general applicability are to be pre- 
ferred to those of restricted or partial meaning. 

Plural nouns which are formed by merely 
adding a syllable to the singular, should be 
employed in preference to the latter. 

The learner must not trouble himself by 
anticipation about the irregularities of verbs and 
nouns, because each tense and case will come to 
him by degrees. They ought not, on any account, 
to be excluded from the sentences on the one 
hand, nor ought they, on the other hand, to be 
studied, or even looked at in a grammar. A word 
of that class, standing in a sentence, is as easy as 
any other word, but if many anomalous forms are 
scrutinized, and more especially if they are exhi- 
bited in an alphabetical list, together with others 
nearly resembling them, the inevitable result will 
be confusion of mind, whenever any one of them 
has to be used. 

Of verbs the active transitive is the best, and 
the most necessary tenses are the past and 
the future, together with the imperative mood, 
and the participles. 

The passive voice may generally be dispensed 
with at first. In some languages it is scarcely 
ever used. 

Compound tenses, being comprehensive, are 
extremely useful. The Latin word rogavissernus 



ON THE SELECTION OF SENTENCES. 123 

is in itself a sentence, which presents to the eye 
the minor forms of rogavissem, rogavisse, rogavimus, 
rogaviy rogamus, rogas, and roga. It also com- 
prises the various notions which in English are 
expressed with greater precision by the auxiliaries 
'might,' 'could/ 'would,' and 'should.' To a 
beginner, therefore, it is doubly comprehensive. 
Elliptical forms of speech appear to be powerful 
and comprehensive in their relation to other lan- 
guages in one point of view, but they are vague 
and defective in another. Our translation of 
rogavissemuSj owing to its uncouth orthography, 
is viewed as a bungling circumlocution. But 
inasmuch as it contains the same number of sylla- 
bles, it is equally concise ; and in point of utility 
and convertibility it is superior ; for whereas the 
Latin syllables are unalterably fixed in one 
sequence, ours may be transposed; and thus we 
obtain the advantage of the interrogative and 
conditional modes of expression in addition. 

At the first view of a new language as 
exhibited in its cabalistic characters, its dictionary 
and its grammar, the labour of learning it appears 
to most people to be overwhelming. But a child 
is not appalled by any considerations of the mag- 
nitude of the undertaking. He cheerfully sets to 
work to make an epitome, and he always succeeds. 
His discrimination of the practical is surprising. 
His stock of phrases indicates to us that it is only 



124 



ON THE SELECTION OF SENTENCES. 



by limiting the number of nouns, that we can 
effectually circumscribe the area of our operations, 
and still set in motion the whole machinery of a 
language. For that which is said concerning a 
noun, in a well-chosen sentence, is of far more 
value to a beginner, than a list of many other 
nouns, to which it may be applicable. 

The practice of learning a number of nouns 
every day, and of rehearsing them with their 
several English equivalents annexed, is very 
irrational. It is not the power of naming, but 
that of predicating that we want. For this 
purpose, the minor parts of speech are perpetually 
required, and the structure of language cannot 
be reared without them. They are often more 
influential than the noun itself, which is constantly 
superseded and merged in its representative 
pronoun. Nouns, when isolated, are not ideas, but 
fragments of dismembered sentences. Connected 
speech should be the sole aim and object of the 
learner. 

The question " What do you call that ? " forms 
an efficient substitute for the names of those 
things, which being always at hand, can always be 
pointed out. Those nouns, unfortunately, are the 
words which we are generally advised to learn 
first ; the assumption being that what we see 
before us, is more easily associated with a new 
sound, than a thing which is not in sight. 



ON THE SELECTION OF SENTENCES. 125 



It is deplorable to hear educated men argue, 
like mere savages, that the proper course is to 
learn the names of things first, because by naming 
them we can ask for them ; as if the great object 
of our intercommunion with foreigners was to beg 
from them, and nothing more. We do not imagine 
the learner to be an adventurer, shipwrecked on a 
coast where civilization is unknown, and the lan- 
guage of which has never been heard by Christian 
ears. In such an emergency, a list of edibles would 
be very desirable, and he would easily obtain one by 
making signs ; but the difficulty of expressing any 
ideas would remain in full force, after he had 
learned the name of every article in a cannibal's 
possession ; and this knowledge after all would be 
of no avail to save him from an uncomfortable 
destiny. 

It is often maintained that because nouns and 
verbs seem, etymologically, to be the foundation of 
all the other parts of speech, and because infants 
often learn them first, adults ought to begin in the 
same way. But this is not the infantile, but the 
maternal process. It is not spontaneous learning, 
but artificial teaching ; it does not pretend to be 
philosophical or scientific ; and there is no intel- 
ligible method pervading it. 

A child four years old, left to his own re- 
sources, begins very differently. When he asso- 
ciates with foreign children, he does not restrict 



126 ON THE SELECTION OF SENTENCES. 



himself to single words, nor does he pick out the 
nouns and verbs, but he learns practical sentences, 
and that without the intervention of any adviser. 
Here is the domain of instinct; but the mere 
infant is not a free agent. 

Science investigates the origin of language, and 
sets us to work upon certain principles, according 
to which each language is supposed to have been 
formed word by word, thoughtfully and elaborately. 

But seeing the difficulty experienced by some 
men of the greatest sagacity and industry in 
attempting to learn foreign words, even when 
sounded in their ears, and placed before them in 
writing, we are not bound to concur in the assump- 
tion that so noble, perfect, and wonderful a work 
as the invention of language, could have been 
accomplished by uncivilized men, who had never 
heard speech before they commenced their opera- 
tions, and who must have been lower in intellectual 
degradation than the lowest of all the tribes 
mentioned in history. 

Whatever its origin may have been, each lan- 
guage appears before us now, as an opus operatum, 
a highly-finished piece of mosaic, which children 
do not pull to pieces, though the learned do. 
Every learner is set to work to reconstruct the 
language de novo, with all its defects and anomalies 
included ; and he naturally imbibes the notion that 
it is impossible for any one to become possessed of 



ON THE SELECTION OF SENTENCES. 127 



it, unless he goes through that course. He is 
compelled to re-originate it for himself, as if all 
the labour, and experience of all his precursors 
were of no avail, except to prove to him that he 
must follow the track of those philosophical bar- 
barians, whose footsteps have been effaced by the 
tramplings of a thousand generations. 

Verbs and nouns are unduly exalted by 
teachers. They are supposed to be the most 
useful parts of speech, because they can do a 
little duty unsupported. But when deprived of 
any of its members, speech halts and staggers like 
a drunken man. Grammarians, in dissecting a 
language, necessarily treat each part of speech 
separately; but that is no reason why we should 
not learn sentences of a good length coherently, 
and analyse them afterwards. 

In a simple language the whole of the pro- 
nouns and articles, and all the commonest conjunc- 
tions, prepositions, and interrogative adverbs, may 
be, and ought to be, introduced into the first set 
of sentences ; because through them we express all 
those relations of time, place, quantity, &c, to 
which we incessantly refer in the every-day affairs 
of life. There can be no question as to the admis- 
sibility of these ; but the choice of the other words 
required for the formation of a set of initiatory 
sentences becomes more and more difficult, in 
proportion to the narrowness of the sphere to 



128 ON THE SELECTION OF SENTENCES. 



which the learner designs to confine his operations. 
If his view does not extend beyond a shabby smat- 
tering, the difficulty of selection is extreme. On 
the other hand, the facility increases with every 
score of words which may be added to the pro- 
gramme. 

In some languages, such as English, Chinese, 
and Hindustani, the whole of the inflections come 
within the range of the first set of sentences. In 
others, the inflections alone amount to a much 
higher number. The difficulty arising from this 
profusion of forms may be best obviated by limit- 
ing the nouns and verbs. The grammarian gives 
us one noun and one verb, as specimens of each 
declension and each conjugation; and beginners, 
who undertake highly inflected languages, would 
work more scientifically and successfully, if they 
would " master " those samples first. But still 
better would it be to restrict themselves, in their 
first efforts, to six or eight nouns, all of one gender, 
and one declension; to the article of the same 
gender, and to three or four verbs all of one con- 
jugation. 

If nouns have five or six cases, the addition of 
a new declension should be made by inserting five 
or six nouns, each in a different case, into one new 
sentence, and then interchanging them. If a pre- 
position governs two or three different cases, it 
should be exhibited with its different powers, 



ON TIIE SELECTION OF SENTENCES. 129 



exemplified in one sentence. In like manner if 
a pronoun, or any other very common word 
has three or four different meanings, it should 
be treated in the same way ; in combination 
perhaps with one or two parts of a verb of a 
new conjugation. 

A limitation of the greatest importance may 
be effected by excluding from the sentences the 
nominatives of three of the personal pronouns ; 
and thus, for the relief of the beginner, reducing 
the verb to one half of its bulk. The selection 
of the three most useful pronouns must be 
determined according to the genius of the lan- 
guage. In English, /, you, and he are much 
more necessary than thou, we, and they ; but 
the English verb has so few inflections, that 
all the pronouns may be learned in the first 
hundred words. 

This exclusion of half the pronouns is not 
altogether arbitrary, for it is analogous to the 
subsisting limitation in narrative composition, 
from which the first and second persons, both 
singular and plural, of the pronoun and the 
verb, are banished, together with all collo- 
quialities and familiarities of speech. This 
accounts for the inutility of book- knowledge, 
unmitigated by some more practical course of 
procedure. 

To carry out simplification to the utmost, 

K 



130 ON THE SELECTION OF SENTENCES. 

while endeavouring to " master " the declinable 
articles, nouns, and pronouns of a highly inflected 
language, it would be advantageous to use only 
three verbs at a time, all of one conjugation, and 
to limit them to the third person singular of the 
past tense. The verb then forms a pivot on which 
the sentences revolve with more smoothness than 
they would if the beginner had also to take 
thought about the tense and person to be employed 
on each occasion. 

The epitome of all languages, as spoken by 
children, whether natives or foreigners, is essen- 
tially the same. The greatest diversity will be 
found in the nouns substantive which they employ, 
because different objects surround them in different 
countries, conditions, and degrees of civilization. 
No set of nouns, therefore, can be universally 
useful. The pursuits, necessities, tastes, and habits 
of travellers are widely different from one another ; 
and there are countries in which our commonest 
articles of food, and many of what we call the 
necessaries of life, are altogether unknown. An 
arbitrary dictation of nouns being therefore inad- 
missible, every learner should choose a set for 
himself. But, on the other hand, the same set of 
verbs is universally employed ; and these, of course, 
are indispensable in every land for the beginner. 
The most useful are those relating to motion 
and transmission, because they bring into active 



ON THE SELECTION OF SENTENCES. 



131 



operation a variety of prepositions. The re- 
maining materials of the universal epitome will 
be found in those two or three hundreds of 
words which are most frequently employed in 
common conversation. 

A language thus learned in miniature may 
seem, at first sight, to be miserably defective; but 
a vast reduction of labour is effected by this plan, 
and it creates great facility for the beginner in 
supplementing all his deficiencies. 

Each sentence ought to be linked with its 
successor by having some word in common with it. 
Those who take pleasure in artificial aids to the 
memory may make a tree of any language, by 
writing their first sentence, containing twenty 
words, in the middle of a large sheet of paper, 
perpendicularly, to represent the stem, and by 
throwing out laterally from each word, a branch 
sentence, containing either that word, or else one 
very obviously connected or contrasted with it. 
The ramifications may be extended day by day, 
until the tree attains to large dimensions ; but its 
greatest utility would be in determining, by the 
concurrent experience of several individuals, what 
sentences and words are the most really useful for 
the guidance of all beginners. 

The genders might be made to alternate in 
uniform succession in every sentence ; or each side 
of the tree might be devoted to one gender; or 



132 ON THE SELECTION OF SENTENCES. 

else the higher, the middle, and the lower parts 
might be severally allotted to nouns of the three 
genders. 

The nouns and verbs should be coloured or 
distinctively marked, both in the tree and in its 
vernacular translation; so that, when practising 
oral composition, the beginner may discern at a 
glance the declension or conjugation to which 
they severally belong, and may employ the appro- 
priate terminations with perfect confidence. In 
sooth, the " scarlet conjugation " and the " blue 
declension 1 ' are terms not less suitable than the 
technicalities now in vogue. 

On such a tree, the addition of a number 
of nouns would only represent so many more 
leaves. They would increase the subjects of 
conversation, but they would not produce any 
augmentation of the power of framing idiomatic 
combinations. 

The gradual formation of such a tree on paper, 
exactly represents the growth of a language in the 
mind of a child, or of any one who learns to talk 
without the use of books. But in one case the 
tree is trained and pruned, and has its fruit 
thinned, in order to improve its quality ; whereas 
the natural, uncultivated plant is often encumbered 
with a mass of foliage, which interferes with its 
productiveness, and checks the rapidity of its 
development. 



CHAPTER VII. 



ON FLUENCY AND LEARNING BY ROTE. 
HE great desideratum is to be able to speak 



like a native; that is, to attain the power of 
employing the whole of our acquisitions so as to 
exhibit facility in composing, and fluency in utter- 
ing, complete idiomatic sentences of a good length. 
This is generally regarded as the finishing achieve- 
ment of a long course of study, though it is 
strictly elemental. It is at once the simplest and 
the highest attainment. It does not require a 
previous study of the grammar. It is not a 
Herculean labour, except when the energies are 
misdirected. In fact, it affords no scope for the 
intellectual athlete to display his powers, because it 
is effected by the simple process of learning by rote. 

Tn spite of the authority of Locke, in favour 
of learning all languages, including Latin, by rote, 
the practice has fallen into great disrepute, the 




134 



ON FLUENCY 



abuse having been generally accepted as a valid 
argument against the rational use of it. It is the 
plan dictated by nature to children ; and it is by 
pursuing this course that they obtain idiomatic 
purity of expression, together with fluency, and 
accuracy of intonation. 

The beginner who adopts this method, learns a 
sentence of which the purport alone has been 
communicated to him. He echoes the sounds, as 
uttered by one of the aborigines, until he has 
" mastered" the pronunciation and intonation, 
as accurately as those who have lived for six 
months among them. By the same effort he 
secures the idiom. 

The construction of the sentence being stu- 
diously concealed from him, under the mask of the 
free translation, he does not know which of the 
new sounds, or how many of them, belong to each 
word, and he can form no idea of the meaning of 
any one syllable. 

This ignorance is his safeguard in respect to 
pronunciation; for, if he understood the words, he 
would infallibly employ the peculiar intonation, 
the accents, the cadences, and the emphasis of his 
own language, because they have become habitual 
to him, and he has been taught that there is but 
one rational and logical mode of uttering a 
sentence. 

When he learns a foreign sentence by rote, he 



AND LEARNING BY ROTE. 



185 



intercepts those trains of thought which involun- 
tarily spring from the habit of analysing every 
word, of comparing it with all those which 
resemble it, either in sound or spelling, whether 
in his own or in other languages; and of ponder- 
ing over genders, numbers, persons, cases, tenses, 
declensions, conjugations, etymology, syntax, and 
prosody. Such excursions of thought are not 
merely useless, but positively obstructive, because 
they employ the imagination and the reasoning 
powers, where they are not required; they crowd 
the memory with fanciful associations, which only 
produce confusion and perplexity ; and they divert 
the attention from the pronunciation, to fix it on 
the spelling and the etymology. 

When sentences are analysed and parsed; 
before the true sounds have been learned thoroughly, 
every word has to run the gaifntlet, as above 
described, and very few of them escape without 
incurring such maltreatment that they cannot 
be recognised in their native country. The 
right order of the words is also forgotten and 
lost. 

But when the beginner keeps his reasoning 
powers in abeyance, and his imagination under 
control, until he can utter the first sentence with a 
good intonation, as if it were only one long word, 
he puts himself on the same vantage-ground as 
a child, and he gains ? by dint of imitation and 



136 



ON FLUENCY 



reiteration, the power of using one practical and 
purely idiomatic form of speech, and of accurately 
pronouncing that combination of sounds ever 
afterwards. 

The meaning of each word and the con- 
struction of the sentence may then be explained 
to him, together with the minor combinations 
which it will yield, and then he may give the 
reins to his classical imagination without incurring 
any risk. 

This is a deviation from routine, and a reversal 
of the usual order of procedure ; but it omits nothing 
essential, and it does not offend against the law of 
reason. The scholar learns by rote, but he learns 
rationally and intelligently ; he saves time and 
labour ; he gains at the outset an intelligible 
pronunciation ; and he familiarizes himself, without 
an effort, with all the ordinary constructions. He 
also keeps his head clear, because his memory has 
only to revert to a limited number of idiomatic 
expressions, over which it soon exercises perfect 
control, instead of traversing a sphere of extensive 
reading in pursuit of words of which it can retain 
only a confused, inaccurate recollection, and then 
linking them together in a manner quite at 
variance with the foreign idiom. 

In learning by rote he commits words to 
memory with extreme precision, in their esta- 
blished order. The only wonder is that so 



AND LEARNING BY ROTE. 



137 



obvious an expedient has met with so much 
obloquy, seeing that poetry is always learned by 
rote, and that the true constructions, delivered 
with fluency in the true intonation, and in the 
true idiomatic order, constitute all the essentials 
of speech. 

To frame grammatical sentences in a foreign 
tongue demands a very severe effort on the part of 
those whose memory is burdened with unconnected 
words, and with technical rules relating to them ; 
because they are compelled to have recourse to 
deliberation when it is the time for action. But 
to interchange words already arranged in their 
proper tenses, cases, and sequences, in a few select 
sentences learned by rote, to frame other sentences 
precisely similar to them, and to utter them without 
hesitation in idiomatic form, are attainments within 
the power of a small child. Some there are who 
contend that the intellectual powers of man are in 
the habit of soaring to such lofty heights that they 
are incapable of descending to the level of childhood ; 
but this method shows how they may be held 
in check, and rendered quite harmless to their 
owners. 

The practice of writing exercises is a sorry 
substitute for oral composition, because it confirms 
slow people in slow habits. Fluency in using 
foreign words is not called forth, and can never be 
attained by a process so deliberate as that of 



138 



ON FLUENCY 



writing. It is useless to walk one mile an hour, as 
a training for a great pedestrian feat. Fluency in 
the vernacular tongue is rather mechanical, than 
intellectual; and it may he developed hy well- 
directed efforts, even in people who seem to be 
naturally deficient in it. 

It is very common to hear a man who has never 
worked in the- right way, and who has therefore 
failed in his attempts to learn a language, main- 
tain, with a semblance of humility, that he labours 
under a special disability in regard to this pursuit. 
But if a mariner will steer to the West, when he 
ought to shape his course to the East, he cannot 
expect to reach his port, until he has gone com- 
pletely round the world. 

There are some men who, if they could utter 
amongst their friends such language as they 
employ in their letters, would be regarded as bril- 
liant speakers; yet in conversing even on the most 
trivial subjects, they speak with extreme hesitation 
and difficulty, because they do not exert the 
requisite urgency upon themselves. They know 
an immense number of choice words and phrases, 
classical and poetical, but they deliberate about 
them while they are talking. The proof of this 
is, that they express themselves very readily and 
very perspicuously when they are not thinking 
about words, that is when they are in a hurry, or 
are otherwise excited ; but on other occasions they 



AND LEARNING BY ROTE. 



139 



leave this power unexercised, and in fact repressed. 
Such men, and their admirers, regard fluency in a 
foreign tongue as an unattainable accomplishment, 
or as the result of a special faculty, which few 
possess. But it may be attained even by those 
who possess it not in their own language, if they 
will confine themselves to a small range of words, 
and practise oral composition, until they can con- 
struct complete sentences more rapidly than they 
can utter them. 

It would be idle to discuss those miserable 
excuses* for hesitation of speech, which people 
alternately proffer to, and accept from one another. 
Fluency is found among both the silliest and the 
cleverest people, and intrinsically it is worthless; 
but as the want of it indicates that the foreign 
words have not been thoroughly digested, it 
must be adopted as a criterion, because it forms 
the only incontestible proof of daily colloquial 
progress. 

The distinctive characteristic then of this 
scheme, is perfect fluency in producing every sen- 
tence which may be expressible, whether directly 
or indirectly, by transposing and interchanging 
the words which have been learned by rote. 
Confidence and self-possession are inspired from 
the very outset, by the conviction that every sen- 
tence which the beginner delivers, is exactly what 



140 



ON FLUENCY 



an educated native would employ, and that it is 
also an unexceptionable model for the formation of 
new ones. 

Whatever he attempts to say to a foreigner is 
to be cast, if possible, in the mould of one of the 
model sentences. He must speak with confidence, 
not with the hasty, slovenly, timorous manner 
of the schoolboy. As accuracy is infinitely better 
than rapidity, every sentence which he tries to 
frame must be thoughtfully constructed up to the 
very last word, and carefully considered before he 
begins to utter it. Promptitude will follow, in good 
time. Coughing and making strange noises during 
the delivery of a sentence must not be tolerated : 
these are but puerile devices to cover the defects 
of the memory, and to gain time to rummage the 
brains for a forgotten word. 

At school we acquire the habit of stopping 
short in the middle of a sentence to deliberate 
about a doubtful word, and this meditation gene- 
rally resolves itself into guessing. We do not 
gainsay the tentative hypothesis of science ; but 
guessing at words is utterly inadmissible, because 
it is directly antagonistic to that precision which 
is the first essential in language. Guess-work is 
the source of innumerable ludicrous mistakes. It 
is at once a fraud and a self-deception, — a crime 
and a blunder. If the right word will not come to 
the lips the instant it is required, a fictitious one 



AND LEARNING BY ROTE. 



141 



may be employed with the foreign termination 
appended to it; and afterwards a circumlocu- 
tion may be used to explain it, if necessary, 
to the astonished foreigner. If the sentences 
which he has learned have been often recited 
aloud, there can be no reason why the speaker 
should not be free from all embarrassment in 
uttering them, even in the presence of a large 
auditory. 

Hastiness and its concomitant, hesitation, are 
the deadliest foes to fluency and self-possession ; 
but there is a certain urgency which we must 
exercise upon ourselves in speaking foreign lan- 
guages. It compels us to employ those practical 
sentences which we know, instead of striving to 
diversify our forms of expression, by recalling 
words over which we have not obtained absolute 
w mastery" and control. 

It is said that Mithridates dispensed with 
interpreters, and spoke face to face with the people 
of more than twenty different nations over whom 
he was the ruler ; but it is not recorded that he 
gained his celebrity as a linguist by hard reading. 
In those days the study of manuscripts was neither 
delectable nor fashionable. He probably picked up 
eacli language, as the courier of the present day 
does, by learning by rote a limited number of 
practical sentences, which were daily addressed, 
under the like urgency, to the strangers who came 



142 



ON FLUENCY 



before him, which were heard with acclamation by 
his courtiers, and which gradually expanded under 
the law of evolution. 

This scheme unites to the knowledge of a few 
words the power of using them, which is of infi- 
nitely higher value to the traveller than the know- 
ledge of many words without that power. The 
book-system fails, because it disunites them. Those 
who have merely learned to translate and to ana- 
lyse foreign books cannot help perpetrating the 
barbarism of connecting words together in accor- 
dance with the forms of their own language. But 
that indolent habit of translating English sentences 
verbatim, must be energetically opposed and sup- 
pressed. The more words people learn incohe- 
rently, the more they become confirmed in the 
habit of translating literally from their vernacular 
tongue ; because they have less difficulty in 
exchanging word for word, in the order in which 
they suggest themselves. Hence it happens that 
hard readers fail, while those who have learnt 
nothing but a few sentences, are compelled to re- 
model the ideas which they wish to express, in order 
to adapt them to those combinations ; and they are 
thus prevented from translating servilely into the 
foreign tongue. The paucity of words, therefore, 
is converted into a positive advantage of the 
highest order. 

When a learner translates a passage of a 



AND LEARNING BY ROTE. 



143 



foreign author, little or no attention is paid to 
the fact that the context enables him to guess 
the meaning of many words, and thus delu- 
sively gives him the appearance of knowing them 
all. But this method provides against the possi- 
bility of any such delusion, because books are for- 
bidden at first, and the real knowledge of the words 
and constructions is indisputably proved by the 
fluency exhibited in employing them in idiomatic 
combinations. 



CHAPTER VIII. 



PRONUNCIATION. 

A CORRECT pronunciation is the first and 
most essential consideration in speaking 
foreign tongues. 

It cannot be expeditiously attained, except by 
carefully imitating, in other words, by repeatedly 
echoing the tones of a native's voice in the utter- 
ance of a few syllables, and by observing the move- 
ments of his vocal organs. 

The course usually followed is a slovenly, irra- 
tional attempt to exact from the vocal organs, the 
duty of producing, by the aid of the eye and 
the memory, sounds and tones which can only 
be recalled by those who have acquired them. 
Recollections of unfamiliar, non-natural sounds are 
so evanescent, that they cannot be relied upon 
for five minutes. Persistent imitations of a few 
sounds should, therefore, be carried on, not 

L 



146 



PRONUNCIATION, 



continuously, but for about ten minutes at a time. 
Four such lessons in a day produce far more 
advantageous results than one long hour's repe- 
titions. 

Some teachers of languages have an indis- 
tinctness, a roughness, or a dissonance of voice, 
which completely baffles the imitative power of 
the learner, and places him in a most disad- 
vantageous position. A clear, soft, refined, and 
deliberate utterance should be considered indis- 
pensable in teachers ; because all their tones, 
accents, emphases, and cadences are to be imitated 
and adopted. It is quite unnecessary to employ a 
professor. A foreign friend with a pleasant voice 
will do the work as effectually, and much more 
agreeably. There is no better exercise than 
mimicking the voices of children who speak accu- 
rately, and echoing in particular the final sylla- 
bles. In every case, to copy nature is the true 
course. 

It is generally supposed that a musical ear is 
a necessary qualification ; but there are excellent 
linguists who have not a particle of music in their 
souls, and amongst great musicians there are some 
who pronounce foreign tongues very badly, and 
some who will not attempt to do it at all. It is 
not by the ear, but by the vocal organs, that the 
work is done ; for every child living with foreigners 
pronounces their language to perfection, unless he 



PRONUNCIATION. 



147 



happens to be deaf. The " lordly savage " has a 
fine ear for a distant footfall in the forest ; but this 
gives him no advantage either as a musician, or as 
a linguist. 

Our habit of pronouncing Latin and Greek 
leads us far astray as linguists, because the sounds, 
and the tones in which we read them, are not 
foreign, but indigenous; and thus we are misled to 
Anglify the pronunciation of other languages also. 

It is a great mistake to try to pronounce one 
syllable or one vowel sound independently : because 
the separate sound is often quite different from 
that which it yields when in combination. For 
the same reason, individual words ought never to 
be separately practised. 

Another error, ruinous in its effects, is to learn 
in company with other beginners, because none but 
the pure, genuine sounds should be heard at first. 

In echoing the pronunciation of short sen- 
tences, the three last syllables should be uttered 
first ; then the four last ; then the five last ; and so 
forth, as in the legend of " The House that Jack 
Built;" which is a master-piece for exercising 
foreign children in pronouncing English. 

It is well known that people who have spoken a 
foreign tongue in early childhood, but have after- 
wards forgotten every word of it, generally have the 
power of regaining the pronunciation at the first 
effort. This is a great advantage, because when 



148 



PRONUNCIATION. 



they resume it, they require nothing but a set of 
written sentences, with their variations and trans- 
lations ; and they are exempt from that threefold 
confusion of mind, which others experience from 
the uncertainty that cleaves to the spelling, to the 
sound, and to the meaning of each word committed 
to memory. It is for the purpose of avoiding that 
triple confusion, that reading and spelling are 
interdicted in this scheme; and the memory and 
understanding have so little given them to do, 
that the attention can be concentrated on the 
pronunciation. 

When we learn our first lessons, we are apt to 
think that if we remember the spelling of the 
words, and can write them correctly, we have, at 
all events, retained the substantial part ; and that 
the correct sounds and tone may be attended to 
afterwards. Sounds may be deemed immaterial 
and unsubstantial when compared with letters, 
which are rendered palpable objects by means of 
paper and ink ; but the words of a living language 
are nothing but sounds. Sounds are the substance; 
and the letters, or symbols, are their shadows. 
Beginners are very apt to lose the substance by 
snatching at the shadow. 

The whole of the sounds of any language 
may easily be included in fifty words ; and it is 
unpardonable to commit them to memory in a 
manner in which they ought not to be uttered. 



PRONUNCIATION. 



149 



Pronunciation is a purely mechanical opera 
tion. When the vocal organs are placed in a cer- 
tain form, certain results follow. If they are not 
placed in that form, those results cannot be 
obtained. To sound M and P, the lips must be 
brought together; to sound V and F, the upper 
teeth must touch the lower lip, and it is impossible 
to utter them without observing these rules. 

The Chinese remark that Englishmen talk with 
their lips ; while neighbouring nations object that 
we talk without using them. Our language does 
not require either the mobility of the latter, or the 
immobility of the former; but we can attain them 
both by perseverance. 

It often happens that there is no gradual 
approximation to the right pronunciation of a new 
sound. By chance it may be uttered aright at 
the first, at the twentieth, or at the fiftieth 
attempt ; but after all, the habit must be acquired, 
and this can only be formed by reiterated imita- 
tion. On the other hand, people may fail after 
many earnest endeavours; but the only cause of 
failure is, that the organs have not been put 
exactly into the right position. Beginners who 
are unsuccessful should closely observe the vocal 
organs of those foreigners who speak most ener- 
getically, and have the greatest degree of mobility 
of countenance. 

Some persons volunteer to call themselves very 



150 



PRONUNCIATION, 



" stupid " about pronunciation, forgetting that the 
operation is one which calls forth no exercise of 
mental power, and that it can only be attained (even 
by the cleverest people) by means of the unintellec- 
tual process of parrotry. 

The less reasoning that is brought to bear upon 
the sounds, when they are first uttered for imita- 
tion, the better chance will there be of success. 
When they are actually acquired, reason may and 
will assert her rights; but then there will be 
nothing left for her either to do, or to undo, in this 
respect. The difficulty of analysing foreign sounds 
is freely acknowledged by those who have studied 
the subject most carefully, and therefore the learner 
should not loiter to theorize about them. 

Every tribe, having a language of its own, has 
some peculiar tones and some movements of the 
vocal organs, which the learner has to discover and 
adopt. It is therefore instructive to watch, very 
narrowly, the manner in which our own language 
is uttered by a foreigner ; to mark the tones, to 
note what words he mispronounces, and to echo 
those tones and sounds. 

The beginner may likewise derive advantage 
from echoing his teacher's voice in reading Latin 
prose, for this will not only be of advantage to 
him in his immediate purpose, but it will also 
qualify him to pronounce Latin intelligibly when 
he travels abroad. The latter object is worth the 



PRONUNCIATION. 



151 



trouble of five or six hours' practice at first, and 
ten minutes a day afterwards. 

By reading a comedy aloud, in company with 
a man from Somersetshire, Kilkenny, Kirkcud- 
bright, or Carnarvonshire, a foreigner may acquire 
whichever of those dialects may be deemed most 
desirable ; and so those provincials, by reversing 
the process, may, in like manner, attain the 
genuine foreign tone by assiduously mimicking his 
voice in return. 

When the learner first pronounces one of the 
new sounds correctly, he generally succeeds with 
others closely following it, because the vocal organs 
happen to be in the right position. This sudden 
success should therefore be promptly and vigor- 
ously followed up, and not one word of his own 
language should be interposed, lest the organs 
should relapse into their wonted and natural posi- 
tion. 

As there are some combinations of letters, in 
which a sound is more easily attainable than in 
others, the beginner should exercise himself with 
various words, containing that sound which he finds 
the most impracticable. When he has discovered 
one in which he can pronounce it successfully, he 
may revert to those which baffled him before ; but 
it is a waste of time to carry on a long struggle 
with one unyielding word. 

'Hie teacher's office is not to be a sinecure. 



152 



PRONUNCIATION. 



He is never to sit listening, and correcting his pupil 
while reading aloud. This is mere charlatanry. 
During the first two months, whatever progress 
may have been made, at least three fourths of each 
sitting should be devoted to imitations of his utter- 
ance. He ought, therefore, to be a good reader. 

Although there may be only three or four new 
sounds to be learned in a new language, there is a 
foreign tone which pervades every utterance. This 
intonation is far more important than the power of 
imitating each individual sound; and therefore 
efforts should be made to acquire it as soon as pos- 
sible, on a small scale. For this purpose a few 
questions, of six or eight syllables each, and con- 
taining none of the peculiar sounds of the foreign 
tongue, should be frequently echoed every day, 
without being translated, or analysed, or studied. 
But the principal object of each day's work should 
be to obtain a perfect intonation and pronuncia- 
tion of the short lesson of the day. This course 
is far more effective and rational than that of 
learning sounds to day, and trusting to the ear, the 
eye, and the memory to reproduce them to-morrow. 

Some persons live almost exclusively among 
foreigners for many years, and listen very hard, 
but yet miss the mark after all, solely through the 
want of imitation, systematically conducted. But 
it is never too late to try again. Beginners who 
pronounce well, and who are said to have a good 



PRONUNCIATION. 



153 



ear, utter the sounds correctly at the first effort, and 
of course reproduce them with ease. Many owe 
their success to their having imitated, perhaps only 
for a few minutes, and then perhaps unconsciously, 
the tones of some congenial voice. There are 
voices which impress their stamp on the listener, 
in tones that never cease to be reverberated. 

An Englishman generally seems to imagine 
that he can pronounce other tongues, without 
deviating from his habitual mode of using his 
vocal organs. He thinks it indecorous to make 
faces, and ridiculous to utter unusual sounds; yet 
the mouth must be opened, sometimes very wide ; 
the throat must be distended ; the pitch of the 
voice must be altered ; and instead of pronouncing 
one syllable of every word with emphasis, while 
others are suppressed and half-smothered, he must 
employ a sustained articulation, so that every indi- 
vidual syllable shall be equally audible. This last 
exercise ought to be practised in reading English 
aloud, for five minutes every day, as a prelude to 
a lesson in the pronunciation of a foreign language. 

Apart from loudness, there is a certain vehe- 
mence of utterance required for some languages. 
It is necessary to observe and cultivate this, because 
if the natives are compelled to make a vigorous 
effort to utter the sounds, we cannot possibly do so 
without still greater exertion. 

There is in most people a feeling of trepidation 



154 



PRONUNCIATION. 



at the sound of their own voices, which operates 
very much to their disadvantage in speaking foreign 
tongues. This feeling may be overcome by daily 
reading some poetry in their own language in a 
very loud voice, and very slowly, taking care 
that not a syllable shall escape unheard, or be 
slurred over, in violation of the rhythm. When 
they have thus reconciled themselves to their own 
voices in very slow utterance, they will not tremble 
to hear them uttering foreign sounds. 

In pronunciation, the force of habit is great, 
and it is well exhibited in that struggle that we go 
through in attempting to throw off the conventional 
artificial tone, in which we are taught to read in 
childhood. A very long series of careful exertions 
is required, before we can read uniformly in the 
natural tone. But this paradoxical effort to be 
natural, as we know to our cost, is in most instances 
unsuccessful; and although we universally express 
so much intolerance for bad reading, the evil is 
constantly augmented and even aggravated by 
bad examples. 

It is easier to learn to pronounce a foreign 
language than to correct a vicious mode of uttering 
our own tongue. And it greatly conduces to such 
correction to practise a foreign intonation, even 
without exercising the memory at all in retaining 
the words. The pronunciation of the mother 
tongue may then be improved by echoing the 



PRONUNCIATION. 



155 



colloquial tones of a good voice for two or three 
hours a day, and by inaudibly following and con- 
stantly observing the cadences of good speakers 
engaged in reading, or in casual conversation. 

In learning a foreign intonation we have not 
to modify our habitual mode of utterance, but 
rather to substitute another that is altogether 
different from it. Yet whether we are learning 
something quite new, or unlearning and con- 
tending against inveterate habit, the instructions 
may all be resolved into two words — "persistent 
imitation." 



CHAPTER IX. 



ENGLISH. 

rPHE English is a very composite language; and 
yet, in the simplicity of. its constructions, it 
is unrivalled amongst the languages of Europe. 
In this respect it is particularly suited to the 
natural method of learning foreign tongues. 

It is said to be deficient in euphony. But this 
scarcely deserves a thought, because the softest 
language loses all its melody when spoken in 
dissonant tones, and the harshest may be listened 
to with pleasure by the most fastidious ear, when 
uttered by a clear, soft voice. It is, therefore, of 
great importance that the teacher should possess 
that qualification. 

In speaking English, foreigners must abstain 
from loudness, from gesticulation, from opening the 
mouth wide, from guttural and nasal sounds, and 
from all vehemence of utterance. The voice and 



158 



ENGLISH. 



the movements must be as subdued as those of the 
teacher from whom they receive the pronunciation. 
They ought carefully to observe that peculiarity 
which results from our laying emphatic stress upon 
one syllable of each word at the expense of the 
others. 

The converse of these rules must be observed 
by an Englishman learning a foreign tongue. He 
should work himself up to be as animated as his 
preceptor; as loud, as vehement, as gesticulative. 
He must not shrink from drawling out the long 
sounds, nor from opening his mouth wide, and 
expanding his throat. 

There is one English sound, and only one, 
which calls for remark, because it defies the efforts 
of all those who are not taught how to place the 
tongue while endeavouring to produce it. It is 
represented by two sign-posts, T and H, which 
only mislead the beginner by pointing in two 
wrong directions. The sound is made by dwelling 
on the letter S, or hissing for twenty or thirty 
seconds, during which the tongue must be gradu- 
ally brought into contact with the upper front 
teeth, and slightly advanced beyond them. A 
variation of the sound is produced by buzzing on 
the letter Z, and advancing the tongue in the same 
manner. 

The erroneous impression that English is a 
very difficult language has arisen chiefly, or 



ENGLISH. 



159 



perhaps solely, from the mischievous practice of 
exposing beginners to the dangers and difficulties 
of our orthography. This is a fortress which is 
far too strong to be taken by a sudden assault, and 
it must therefore be masked at the beginning of 
the campaign. In other words, the learner must 
not see, nor must he even imagine, the spelling 
of one word, until he has gained the colloquial 
" mastery " over one hundred. 

The simplicity of the language will be acknow- 
ledged when the paucity of inflections is seen in 
the table at page 166. Many of the verbs are on 
the following small scale, viz., cut, cuts, cutting. 
Another class has four forms, as look, looks, looking, 
looked. And the largest class has five forms, as 
speak, speaks, speaking, spoke, spoken. The auxi- 
liary verbs, by which the various compound tenses 
are framed, have altogether only twenty-five forms. 

Nouns have only one case, the genitive, which, 
in most instances, is identical with the sign of the 
plural number. 

Pronouns have a genitive and an accusative 
case also. 

The dative and ablative cases are unknown, 
except in the adverbial nouns, here, there, where ; 
which have for their datives, hither, thither, whither ; 
and for their ablatives, hence, thence, whence. 

The syntax, as given by Dr Johnson, contains 
only five rules, which are exemplified in the following 



160 



ENGLISH. 



short sentence; — u Your friend's brother wishes 
us to go with him." The constructions are so simple 
that any educated man may learn the whole of 
them in one sitting, and compose similar sentences 
with perfect ease. 

When a grammatical difficulty occurs to a 
foreigner, let him remember that language takes 
precedence of grammar in this scheme, and that 
the scientific solution of a puzzling question is of 
no importance, when compared with the power of 
employing the constructions correctly. After he 
knows the language, he may give his whole life to 
the study of grammar. 

Some writers inconsiderately maintain that 
ours is the natural and logical order of arranging 
words in sentences; but every other nation like- 
wise regards their own as the most natural and 
rational. The people at the Antipodes think that 
our order should be reversed, and they are quite as 
competent to judge as we are. 

In like manner Englishmen try to persuade the 
Chinese that our system of writing sounds is 
simpler and more rational than theirs; but when 
the numerous discordant uses of the letter A are 
explained to the Mandarin, he is as much and as 
justly amazed at the ignorance of his teachers, as 
they are at his. Italians or Germans would have 
some show of reason if they recommended their 
orthography; but we have none. 



ENGLISH. 



161 



There are some truths, which it is deemed 
indecorous to state in plain explicit terms. It is 
necessary therefore to crave the forbearance of the 
reader, for the remark that English has never 
been considered worthy of being studied, by other 
nations, as a vehicle for conveying instruction in 
the science of grammar. It is utterly unfit for that 
purpose, and let foreigners therefore beware of 
wasting one moment on the study, There is 
a scantiness in the syntactical forms and in- 
flections, which renders the grammar intensely 
difficult. The science of grammar was invented by 
men who spoke and wrote two highly complicated 
languages, Greek and Sanscrit. But Latin was 
found to be the most suitable medium for illustrating 
the science in Europe ; and its grammar, although 
in many respects inapplicable to other languages, 
and totally unsuitable to some, is adopted as the 
universal model. Thus our grammars of the Chi- 
nese language are full of information which is 
incomprehensible to the most astute and accom- 
plished .Mandarin. The grammarians enlarge in 
technical terms on moods, tenses, persons, cases, 
concord, government, &c, although these have no 
existence either in the Chinese language, or in the 
imagination of the people. Logic and metaphysics 
are called in to contribute to the explanation 
of the mysterious science; but without illustra- 
tions drawn from foreign languages, containing 

M 



162 



ENGLISH. 



exemplifications of the principles propounded, 
grammar must continue to be a most unintelli- 
gible study. English is almost as simple in its 
constructions as Chinese, and the study of its 
grammar can only be an impediment to a foreigner 
who wishes to learn the language colloquially. 

But although the constructions are so few and 
so simple, and although the inflections are on so 
small a scale, the efforts of beginners will be frus- 
trated, unless they acquiesce in the restrictions 
suggested, but especially in this, that the collo- 
quial attainment must precede all study of the 
written language. When the object of the learner, 
however, is solely to read our literature, the course 
to be pursued is altogether different. On this 
subject let him refer to the chapter on Book-work. 

Annexed is a list of the commonest words of 
the language, both declinable and indeclinable. 
Four of these, on an average, will be found in 
every line of an English book, and in every col- 
loquial sentence containing a dozen words. This 
list is not to be learned by heart, nor is it intended 
to be used in any way by the beginner. Its object 
is merely to shew which are the most essential 
words in all languages, in order that they may be 
introduced into the sentences which are to be 
translated and given to beginners. There are no 
nouns included in the list, because it is for the 
learner himself to select and insert those which 



ENGLISH. 



163 



he will have most occasion to use at first. It may 
be said that the list contains merely what all 
grammars exhibit; but this method prohibits the 
use of grammars and all other English books at 
the outset. 

Some sentences have been given on page 165, 
from which, with the aid of an interpreter, 
the foreigner is to make a selection for his own 
use, altering them, or enlarging them, or substi- 
tuting others for them, according to his own con- 
venience, but never reducing them in length. 

The synopsis of the language is to be kept 
open before the learner, to help him to any case or 
tense which he may require, when he attempts to 
compose variations of those sentences which he has 
committed to memory. 



164 



A LIST OF THE COMMONEST ENGLISH WORDS, 

DECLINABLE AND INDECLINABLE. 





but 


T 
1 


not 


-tin 
still 


upon 


cl 1 )(_) t 1 1 




if 
11 


now 


such 


upper 


after 


Directly 


in, into 






us 


again 


down 


instead of 


Of 


1 Jian 




ago 


during 


it 


off 
Oil 


that 


Very 


all 




its 


often 


the 




EjtXy 11 




on 


their 


vv e 


ulonc 


cither 


.Large 
last 


only 


them 


wall 

wen 


ill so 


else 


or 


then 


what 


ill 1 1 1UU GjTl 


enough 


lest 




there 


when 




every 


let 


our 61 


therefore 


where 




except 


lil-p 


on rs 


these 




ami 




out of 


they 


while 


another 


Far 


Many 


over 


this 


who 


any 

as 


few 


me 


own 


those 


whole 


first 


mine 


Perhaps 


though 


Avhom 


at 


for 


more 


through 


whose 


away 


forward 
from 


most 
much 


Quickly 
quite 


to, till 

to-day 


why 
will 


Back 




my 


together 


with 


because 


He 


Rather 


to-morrow 


without 


before 


her 


Near 


too 




behind 


here 


neither 


Several 


towards 


Yes 


below 


hers 


never 


she 




yesterday 


beside 


him 


next 


since 


Under 


yet 


best 


his 


no 


slowly 


unless 


you 


better 


how 


none 


some 


until 


your 


between 


however 


nor 


soon 


up 


yours 



Am 
are 

Be 

been 

being 

bought 

bringing 

brought 

buying 

Called 



One 
two 
three 
four 



came 

can 

can't 

come 

couldn't 

Did 

do * 

does 

doing 

done 

don't 



five 
six 
seven 
eight 



Find 
found 

Given 
going 
gone 

Had 
has 
have 
having 



nine 
ten 

eleven 



Is 


Saw 


stopped 




seen 




Made 


selling 


Taken 


makes 


sends 


telling 


may 


sent 


told 


might 


shall 


took 


must 


shan't 






shouldn't 


Wanted 


Ought 


showed 


was 


shown 


won't 


Procure 


sold 


wouldn't 


putting 






twelve 


twenty 


fifty 


thirteen 


thirty 


hundred 


fifteen 


forty 


thousand 



165 



SAMPLES OE SENTENCES 

CONTAINING FROM TWENTY TO THIRTY OF THE COMMONEST WORDS. 

Why did you not ask him to come, with two or three of his 
friends, to see my brother's gardens ? 

Can you let me have a sitting-room on the first floor at the front 
of the house, and two bed-rooms on the second floor at the back ? 

Send this letter, if you please, to No. 15 West street, and tell the 
messenger to wait for an answer. 

When the man who brought this parcel for me yesterday evening- 
calls again, give it back to him, and tell him that this is not what 
I ordered at the shop. 

Tell the porter to call me at half-past seven o'clock to-morrow 
morning, and to bring me a cup of coffee and a jug of hot water. 

W^ill you enquire at what hour the earliest fast train starts for 
Windsor, and whether there is an hotel at the station where it stops ? 

Let me see the bill of fare and the list of wines, that I may order 
dinner for a party of four, whom I expect to arrive here this evening 
at a quarter past six. 

Ask your groom what it was that he received through the little 
window of the horse box when the train stopped at the Stafford 
station ? 

Take this back to the shop, and say that I don't like the colour, 
and that I will call again the next time I come up to town. 

Ask him what has become of the books which he promised to 
send me last week, before I started for the sea -side. 

Where can T procure some cigars of the same sort as those which 
you bought for me at Genoa, when we met there six months ago? 

If I had not met your servant in the street, I should not have 
known that you had returned with your family from Spain. 



1.06 



PARADIGM OR SYNOPSIS, 

SHOWING THE VARIATIONS OF THE COMMONEST DECLINABLE 
WORDS IN THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE. 



I 


me 


my 


mine 


He 


him 


his 


his 


She 


her 


her 


hers 


It 


it 


its 




We 


us 


our 


ours 


You 


you 


your 


yours 


They 


them 


their 


theirs 


Who 


whom 


whose 





This, these. That, those. 
Take takes taking took taken 
Have has having had had 

Do does doing did done 

Want wants wanting wanted wanted 

Be, being, been. 

Am, is, was, were. 

Can, could. May, might. 

Shall, should. Will, would. 

Large, larger, largest. 
Person, person's. Persons, persons'. 



CHAPTER X. 



TELOOGOO. 

HP HIS ancient language is supposed to have been 
introduced into Hindostan by Scythian tribes, 
before the arrival of the Brahmins, who gradually 
drove them down to the southward, where they 
now occupy a territory of nearly 100,000 square 
miles, in the Madras Presidency, with a population 
of about 15,000,000 souls. 

The language is very different in its forms from 
those of Europe, and it is classed in the Turanian 
order. 

How to utilize that minute knowledge of Latin 
and Greek which we acquire in the most valuable 
decade of our little lives, is a point not much 
regarded by teachers of modern languages. The 
methods are generally supposed to be antagonistic 
and irreconcileable. It is possible, however, to put 
languages in apposition to each other, by means of 



168 



TELOOGOO. 



translations into Latin and Greek, and to graft 
foreign terminations on familiar words, so as to 
explain peculiar constructions without having re- 
course to a grammar. Venerable prejudices will be 
shocked ; but the extreme torture to which Latin 
has been put by the Hamiltonian system shall be 
carefully avoided. In that scheme, as applied to 
the colloquial acquisition of modern tongues, the 
ne plus ultra of error has been attained, inasmuch 
as the idiomatic order of the words is remorselessly 
sacrificed. 

In Teloogoo every word ends with a vowel, an 
arrangement highly conducive to euphony. A 
question is asked by changing the final vowel of 
a word or of a sentence into a. Have they re- 
turned, or have they fallen? would be rendered 
Rediera? Cecidera? But when a question begins 
with an essentially interrogative word, as " Who," 
" when," or " where," the final vowel is not changed 
into a. So quis, quando, &c, do not accept the 
assistance of "an" or "ne." 

Emphasis is bestowed on a word by changing 
its final vowel into e. Thus to the question fore- 
going, Cecidere, non rediere would be a fitting 
reply. 

Doubt is expressed by changing the final 
vowel into 6. Thus Eediero, cecidero, would 
mean I do not know whether they have returned 
or fallen. 



TELOOGOO. 



169 



The letter N is often inserted for euphony's 
sake, as in Greek and English. Thus, Fluviona? 
prseliona? Was it in the river, or in the battle 
that they fell? 

There is a past participle which in Latin is 
only found in deponent verbs as fatus, egressus, 
&c. It is formed, as it were, by removing the last 
syllable from viximus, duximus, &c, retaining the 
short sound of the second syllable. In translating 
the following words : " He reigned for twenty 
years, led his armies into remote countries, lived to 
a great age and died childless," — each clause would 
end with a verb, and they would stand thus: 
Rexi, cluxi, vixi, obiit. Two verbs cannot be 
united by a conjunction, and therefore this par- 
ticiple, which is indeclinable, is always on active 
service, absorbing the conjunctions employed in 
English and Latin. 

When the syllable te is added to the same par- 
ticiple it absorbs the conjunction if. Thus, Nos 
legite, if we read. 

When the syllable na is added to it, it absorbs 
the definite article, and the relative pronoun in all 
their cases. Thus, I did not see the book which 
you sent, Tu misma librum non vidi. He will keep 
the letter which I wrote, Ego scripsina epistolam 
retinebit. I clo not know the name of the town 
to which they came. Illi venina oppidi nomen 
nescio. 



170 



TELOOGOO. 



Another relative participle is similarly em- 
ployed to indicate present and future time. 

The tenses in common use are only two, 
the present which does duty for the future, as 
when we say, "I am going to-morrow;" and 
the perfect which is the past participle above 
described, with various terminations affixed 
thereto. 

The third person singular has two distinct ter- 
minations ; one masculine, the other feminine and 
neuter. In the third person plural, however, 
women share with men the honours of the first 
termination, while the second is only used with 
neuter nouns. So the Greeks employed both eicnv 
and eaTLv in the plural. 

There is a declinable verbal noun, the want of 
which is awkwardly supplied in Latin and Greek 
by the infinitive mood, and in English by the pre- 
sent participle. Under the mystical appellation of 
gerund, the passive participle is pressed into the 
service in Latin, to obviate that difficulty of 
expressing the cases which the Greeks overcame 
by means of their declinable definite article. In 
active verbs, this form retains its transitive power ; 
and although declinable throughout as a noun, it 
is not used in conjunction with possessive pro- 
nouns and adjectives, but with personal pronouns 
and adverbs. Thus its force as a verb continues 
unimpaired. Its termination is " dum a fact 



TELOOGOO, 



171 



which may perhaps suggest reflections to the 
learned. 

There are negative forms of the verbal noun, 
the imperative mood, and the relative parti- 
ciples above mentioned. There is also a negative 
aorist, which is framed, not by the addition of a 
negative particle, but by the pretermission of the 
affirmative affix, which intervenes between the 
root and the distinctive personal terminations of 
the present tense. It is worthy of notice that 
these terminations are affixed to the personal pro- 
nouns, as well as to the verb, and therefore they 
are, in their nature, distinct from the pronouns. 

The Teloogoo paradigm inserted at page 184, 
gives a remarkable series of words in the first 
three columns. The monosyllables at the head of 
each list severally represent "this," "that," and 
"what;" and the words placed below them, in- 
dicating time, place, quantity, person, and manner, 
are for the most part declinable representatives of 
our adverbs " here," " there," " where ; " " now," 
" then," " when," &c. The advantage of having 
them presented to the learner, so that each of 
these words forms a clue to two others, will be 
manifest at the first glance. 

In Teloogoo the conjunction and, when coupling 
two substantives, is used doubly, like the Latin que. 
When it is affixed to who, and followed by a nega- 
tive verb as " Quisque nequit," it signifies "no 



172 



TELOOGOO. 



one can." " Quidque agere nequeo " means " I 
can do notliing at all." When added to the number 
" two," it signifies " both." When added to " three," 
"four," or any other higher number, it means "All 
three," " All four," &c. The omission of the con- 
junction in such phrases is not allowable. 

Many Sanscrit nouns substantive ending in Mm, 
are freely employed; and in these the last syllable 
is liable to elision, as in Latin verse. In like 
manner, the final vowel of one word is sometimes 
merged in the initial vowel of the next word. 

I'h ere are two forms of the pronoun we. One 
is dual, including the person or persons addressed. 
The other is the editorial and imperial " We." 
The latter is always used by Europeans, and by the 
great men of the land ; but it is inadmissible when 
the speaker includes the person addressed. The 
first-mentioned form seems to have sprung from 
the institution by which property is held in common 
by a whole family; so that the words meum and 
tuum cannot be employed without giving offence. 
The North American tribes have a similar form of 
speech ; but it is not clear that they ever enjoyed 
a despotism which predominated over m.eum and 
tuum so effectually, as to merge them both in a 
singular nostrum., and thus to render a distinctive 
dual or plural form essential to the peace of all 
undivided families. 

A servant or dependant always uses the singular 



TELOOGOO. 



173 



I when he addresses his master. It would be 
insolence on his part to use the royal We. In 
speaking to men of good position, the constant 
repetition of the word thou is distasteful to them ; 
but if their official superior always addresses them 
in the plural number, it is liable to be miscon- 
strued as a symptom of subservience on his part. 
There is no other form of address, because the 
idea of equality is not expressible, being neither 
admitted nor understood. The safe course for an 
official, is to use the plural number freely and pro- 
miscuously even to ordinary people; or else to 
employ the singular invariably in public. It is 
more courteous to drop the singular when it can 
easily and naturally be avoided; but it is very 
difficult to extemporize the requisite circumlocu- 
tions, and a beginner cannot fail to shackle himself 
by attempting it. 

Punctuation is not required in Teloogoo. The 
verb is the last word in every sentence, and every 
clause; and the order of the words is very much 
inverted. In the translation of an English letter, 
the final verb of the first sentence is converted 
into a participle, which receives some conjunctive 
affix equivalent to as, since, although, when, where, 
&c, and it is thus united to the second sentence. 
By this arrangement the divisions of the subject 
are marked in a manner which, though perfectly 
lucid to the Oriental mind, is extremely fatiguing 



174 



TELOOGOO. 



to those who are accustomed to the luxury of 
having points to regulate their breathing. Many 
of our countrymen exhibit great intolerance for 
forms of thought, and expressions, which are so 
much at variance with our classical models. And 
there are few who submit, at first, with a good 
grace to the practice of connecting different sen- 
tences together by means of links, which the 
languages of Europe do not possess. 

This reluctance to adopt Oriental forms of 
thought must be overcome at the outset, by learn- 
ing long sentences, containing as many of the 
antagonistic forms of speech as possible. If the 
beginner affects conciseness he will find himself in 
this predicament, that orders addressed to Hindoos, 
with great consideration for the grammatical pro- 
prieties, will be imperfectly understood, because 
they are deficient in circumstantiality. He must 
divest himself of the habit of omitting every word 
which may, either classically or logically, be deemed 
superfluous. Those standards are altogether inap- 
plicable in the East. By attempting to practise 
economy of time, the beginner may save two or 
three seconds ; but there may be a great expendi- 
ture of temper incurred in expounding his own 
oracular phraseology, or in witnessing the miscar- 
riage of a project through the misapprehension of 
the person addressed. 

There is a pedantry in employing superfine 



TELOOGOO. 



175 



book-language in speaking to illiterate foreigners, 
whose thoughts run in very different channels from 
our own. On the other hand, it is an egregious 
mistake to descend to the lowest dialect, in order 
to render our speech more intelligible to the 
vulgar. This is an error which is generally 
defended and inculcated by the indolent, who have 
never risen to a higher attainment. The learner's 
object should be to make himself universally intel- 
ligible ; and for this purpose the pure and simple 
Teloogoo is the best. 

To be intelligible to the Hindoos, we must 
accept facts as we find them. In Europe certain 
signs and gestures are supposed to be natural and 
universal ; but if we beckon to a Hindoo, he retires ; 
and if we reverse the signal, he approaches. Even 
the dogs misunderstand us; for the Hindoo snaps 
his fingers as a menace and a hint to withdraw; but 
English dogs put a different interpretation on the 
movement, and so the Brahmin incurs defilement 
by his own act. 

There are no words in Teloogoo corresponding 
to Yes and No. It is therefore unclassical and 
illogical to insist upon what we call a categorical 
answer. It is equally absurd on our part to em- 
ploy, indiscriminately, the words which most nearly 
correspond to Yes and No. They signify " There 
is," and " There is not." Numerous are the mis- 
understandings that arise from the proud defiance 



176 



TELOOGOO. 



with wliicli Englishmen trample upon the laws of 
the language, and then impute stupidity, with a 
stupidity still greater, because less excusable, than 
that of the uneducated servant. In some parts 
of Ireland, the people are as abstemious as the 
Hindoos in the use of Yes and No. The correct 
answer to a question requires the use of the verb : 
Have you heard? I heard it yesterday. Do you 
want ? I want. Did he send ? He sent. The 
indolent response " There is," completely bewilders 
the questioner. The necessity for attending to this 
peculiarity from the very beginning, is obvious 
enough. 

It is necessary to discard every interjection 
and exclamation to which we are accustomed 
in English ; and to bear in mind that it is not 
safe to translate anything literally into Teloogoo. 
It is better to say to a servant " Hear," than 
" Here." Instead of " Go and see," we must say, 
" Having looked, come." Instead of "Go to 
your dinner," it must be " Having eaten your 
dinner, come." The Hindoos omit the going. We 
omit the coming. And this omission in Teloogoo 
may lead to a long absence on the servant's part. 

There are no adjectives corresponding to ullus 
and nullus, nor is there an adverb precisely corre- 
sponding to 72071, because the negative aorist takes 
the part generally performed by that word. There 
are two different substantive verbs signifying There 



TELOOGOO. 



177 



is not, and It is not, The former relates to mere 
existence ; the latter to quality. These give rise 
to very precise distinctions. The correct use of 
these words in Teloogoo demands an exercise of 
though tfulness which, if applied to the collections 
of fallacies exhibited by Whately, Mills, and 
other writers on Logic, would form a valuable 
combination of the study of Grammar with its 
sister science. 

Among the Hindoos the word speak or say is 
constantly superseded by the words command and 
submit. Every word of the great is an order; 
every word of the inferior is a submissive repre- 
sentation, or prayer. The circumlocution depart- 
ment of the language will be found very extensive ; 
but there are also many gems of concise and elegant 
phraseology. 

The greatest source of confusion to beginners 
attempting the colloquial part, is the absence of 
certain active transitive verbs, which seem to us 
to be indispensable. There are no words which 
correspond exactly with have, want, like, love ', find, 
meet, see, understand, bring, and take away. These 
constitute obstacles which some people never com- 
pletely overcome. Passive and neuter verbs, or 
circumlocutions, are employed to express those 
ideas. Have is disposed of as in Latin. u Have 
you a house?" "Is there a house to you?" 

N 



178 



TELOOGOO. 



Instead of saying " Did you meet the Rajah?" the 
Hindoo says "Did the Rajah come opposite to 
you ? " or u Has he passed along this road ? " 
For " Have you seen any camels? " he says " Have 
any camels appeared to you ? " For " Have you 
found the book ? " " Has the book been found to 
you?" or "Has it appeared to you?" For " Do 
you understand ? " he says u Is it known to you? " 
For "I want some fruit," he says "Some fruit 
must be to me." For " I don't like that," he says 
" That is not agreeable to me." " Bring dinner " 
is expressed by " Having taken the dinner, come ! " 
" Take away that," is " Having taken that, go! " 
The notion that in seeing, understanding, &c, 
we are passive, is here shadowed forth in the 
language. 

When foreigners speak unintelligible English, 
we are prone to make merry with them, rather 
than to condemn ourselves for our ignorance 
and inability to fathom their meaning. But 
when the scene is reversed, our ideas are 
reversed, and we are dissatisfied with the luck- 
less wight who cannot understand his own lan- 
guage, when burlesqued both in phraseology and 
intonation. 

There is sometimes such a total disregard 
of pronunciation among Englishmen, that their 
Teloogoo is utterly useless to them. Quantity, 



TELOOGOO. 



179 



quality, and intonation are sacrificed, for the sake 
of a rapid delivery in reading and translating 
examination papers. 

It is necessary to bear in mind that every 
vowel sound remains uninfluenced by the consonant 
which succeeds it. Whether it be long or short, 
the pronunciation is uniformly the same. The 
stress is always laid on the long syllable, and the 
duration of the sound is not merely nominally, but 
actually equal to that of two short syllables. When 
a short vowel comes before two consonants, it 
attracts one of them to itself to form the first 
syllable, and the voice rests upon it long enough 
to give time for the intermediate utterance of 
another short syllable. This gives the true quan- 
tity and rhythm to perfection. In the recitation 
of Latin verse, such words as pocula and litem, 
do not receive justice in respect to the time 
occupied in uttering the first syllable, because in 
accentuating a syllable we generally make it ex- 
tremely short. Such mispronunciation in Teloogoo 
involves a series of false quantities which, com- 
bined with false pronunciation, renders the words 
unintelligible. Schoolboys are taught to give two 
different sounds to a vowel to show that they 
know the prosody, and then the duration of time 
is violated with impunity. We utter all our dis- 
syllables like the trochee, or the pyrrhic; but we 
never pronounce two long syllables so as to form 



180 



TELOOGOO. 



a spondee. Hence the impracticability of English 

hexameters. 

Our poets make monosyllables either short or 
long in English ; but in speaking we give them 
a very short sound. We also make some vowel- 
sounds so extremely short, that three of them 
would not exceed the duration of one long sound 
in Teloogoo. This clipping of the sounds is quite 
opposed to the measured modulated utterance of 
the Hindoos. 

A careful separation of syllables is essential. 
The Teloogoo word for "antelope" is "lady:" 
but the first syllable is fully three times as long as 
we pronounce it, and then the sound of D begins. 
If we pronounce the word in our accustomed 
way, making the first syllable " laid," it is in- 
comprehensible to a Hindoo. His orthography, 
being phonetic, leaves no scope for guess-work, 
or imagination. Ours, on the contrary, is so full 
of vagaries, that Ave are prone to indulge in 
the conceits suggested by innumerable grotesque 
similarities amongst words differently spelt, and 
startling differences between those which resemble 
each other in sound or spelling. Our training, 
moreover, being chiefly analytical and critical, 
we find it hard to believe that the Hindoo 
cannot understand a sentence of his own tongue, 
which we would readily submit to the scrutiny 
of a Board of Examiners. Nevertheless the 



TELOOGOO. 



181 



fault cannot possibly be on his side, when he 
is puzzled by the words of his own language; 
and therefore it behoves us to look to our 
pronunciation. 

The enunciation of the people is very distinct, 
and there are no harsh or difficult sounds in the 
language. They have no vowel sounds which are 
foreign to us ; but there are some of ours which are 
foreign to them, and which we must therefore 
scrupulously eschew. These are the vowel sounds 
in "mat," "war," and "lot." The third is 
the short sound of the second, but as a safe- 
guard, it is better to treat them as three 
separate rocks on which we are. sure to strike, 
if we imagine the English spelling of the Teloogoo 
words. 

Many Englishmen are unable to discriminate 
between the dental and palatal sounds of T, D, N, 
&c. The palatal is formed by turning the tongue 
upwards and backwards, and the dental is attained 
by bringing the tongue in contact with the upper 
front teeth, and advancing it a little out of the 
mouth, before pronouncing the consonant. It may 
be practised in English by uttering words be- 
ginning with T or D, but not TH. Great care 
must be taken not to aspirate the sound. After 
ten minutes' practice, the peculiar effect produced 
will, perhaps, become perceptible to the learner; 
but whether he can detect it or not, he need 



182 



TELOOGOO. 



not be discouraged; because he cannot fail to 
utter the right sound if he puts his tongue 
in the right place. The habit of keeping the 
tongue always ready to touch the front teeth, 
before uttering the dentals, must be acquired 
as soon as possible. By observing this rule, and 
by studying a very deliberate articulation of each 
syllable, a good pronunciation may be rapidly 
attained. 

The Dravidian languages so closely resemble 
each other, that this sketch of Teloogoo will form 
an introduction to them all. To the general 
reader, w 7 ho will glance at the sentences, it will 
show the intrinsically different character of those 
languages as vehicles of thought. To the young 
officer destined for the public service in South 
India, it will show the advisability of adopting the 
child's method, in order to overcome, one by one, 
those difficulties to which a multitude of his 
predecessors have reluctantly been compelled to 
succumb, in consequence of their endeavouring to 
grapple with them all at once. 

A few samples of sentences are annexed, 
marked with figures, to show the manner in which 
the words are arranged in Teloogoo. They relate 
only to subjects upon which an Englishman must 
necessarily communicate with the natives, and 
which he ought therefore to have on the tip of his 
tongue. The Teloogoo sentences are given in the 



TELOOGOO. 



183 



English character, the vowels being marked to 
indicate the pronunciation, in the following 
manner : 



a as 


in America 


u as 


in pull 


a , 


star 


u. , 


, rule 


1 , 


> i 11 


e , 


pen 


I , 


, magazine 


e , 


, there 




, potato 


ei , 


height 


6 ,. 


groan 


au 


cloud 



184 



PARADIGM 

or THE 

COMMONEST INFLECTIONS IN TELOOGOO. 





a 


e-emi 


Idi 


adl 


tdi 


dlni 






dlniki 


Uaill K I 


flnn?l-i 

cieniKi 


dinni 






IvI 


avT 


evi 


vltl 


viitl 


vS¥t 

Vtll 


vitlkl 


varlki 


vetikl 


vltinl 


vatlnl 


vetlnl 


Ikkuda 


5kkada 


gkkada 


Ippudu 


appudii 


gppudii 


ftadfi 


atadii 




Inta 


ant a 


enta 


Indaru 


ftndaru 


£ndaru 


TnnT 


anni 


enni 


Indu 


&nda 


endii 


Itla 


atla 


etla 


I ratal a 


avatala 


gvatala 


vldii 


vadii 


i? vadii 


vlrii 


vanl 


ev&rfi 


vTndlu 


vandlu 


C-vvandlu 


iyanii 


ay an a 


eyana 


line 


ame 



nenti 


nivu 


tanu 


na 


nl 


tana 


nakii 


nlkii 


tanakii 


nannu 


nlnnu 


tannu 


memu 


mini 


tamu 


ma 


mi 


tama 


maku 


mlku 


tamaku 



mammiina mimmuna tammiina 

manamii 
mana 
manaku 
manamiina" 



unnanu 

unnawii 

iinnadu 

finnadi 

ttndi 

tanu 

tawu 

tadu 

tunnadi 

tttndi 

I nan u 

inawii 

inadu 

Inadl 

indi 

tin! 
tivi 
enu 

una 



umu 

mi 

a 

adamii 

uta 

edi 



anu 
awu 
adu 
adi 

ami 
anl 



amu 
aru 
aru 
avi 

tamu 

taru 

taru 

tunnavi 

tfinvl 

inamu 
Inarii 
in aru 
Inavi 

timl 

tiri 

ri 

urfi 
unu 

damu 
dam ii 
and! 

utunna. 

atti 

1 

ina 
e 

amu 
arii 
aru 
awu 

akii 

akandi 

akiinda 



li 


im 


va 


valtl 


mti 


multl 


mil 


alu 




lula 


va 


vala 


ptt 


mula 


pu 


ala 


llki 


lttlaku 


vakii 


valaku 


munaku mttlaku 


amki 


alaku 


linl 


lulanii 


vanti 


valanu 


munu 


mulanu 


anni 


alanti 






du 


du 


li 


ru 










di 


ni 


li 


tl 










diki 


niki 


liki 


tiki 










ni 


nl 


liinu 


runii 














la 


ta 







184 ; 



TELOOGOO SENTENCES. 



12 345 6 __ 78 9 

1. Ni ajagrata walla yl vela wudiana memtl sawarl velladanaku 

10 11 12 13_ 14 15 16 17 18 

lekS poyindi ganaka ma gurranni layamu. loki tisukoni vellamam 

19 so 
gurrapuvanito cheppu. 



20 19 17-18 13 14 16 15 

1. Tell the horse-keeper to take away my horse to the stable, 

12 3 1 2 7 10-11 9 

because by your carelessness I have been prevented from going out 

8 4-5 6 

to ride this morning. 



12 3 4 5 67 8 

2. Niwu carnel dhoravari basaku twaraga parigetti ninna tellawarlkl 

9 10 II 12 13_ 14 15 

vadalonunchl digina dhoralalo yevarama ma perata wuttaralaina 

16-17 18 19 2D 21 

mutalaina, tisukowachmar5 ledo telusuko ra. 



6 1 5 2-3 4 20 

2. Run thou quickly to the Colonel's house, and inquire whether 

12 11 10 10 9 9 8 7 

any of the gentlemen who landed from the ship at daybreak yesterday 

18 is 15 17 16 13-14 19 19 

have brought letters or parcels for me or not. 



1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 

3. A dhoravaru memii pampmchina wtittaram ni daggera tisukoni 

9 10 _ 11 12 13 14 15 16_ 

repatlki tame wastamani sheluvichinanduku varu ye dovanu wastard 

17 18 _ 19 20_ 21 22 23 24_ _25 

adinni ye velakti wastaro adinni niwu yenduku adiginawu kawii. 



12 1 2 8 76454 

3. When that gentleman received from you the letter which 

3 4 12 10 11 9 23 24 22 

I sent, and said that he himself would come to-morrow, why did you 

"-6 24 14 15 17-21 18 19 13 16-20 

not ask by which road and at what time he was coming ? 



CHAPTER XL 



HINDUSTANI. 
HIS language is spoken all over India as a 



A lingua franca. There is .so great a variety 
and latitude in its pronunciation, that no one can 
fail to speak it intelligibly. In this respect, as 
well as in the simplicity of its constructions, it 
affords an excellent subject for an experiment 
in "mastering" a hundred words, with very little 
exertion. 

One characteristic of the language is, that 
the terminations a and i are used to represent 
the masculine and feminine singular; and e to 
represent both genders in the plural number of 
verbs, as well as of substantives, adjectives, and 
possessive pronouns. Thus the learner is saved 
from the perplexity arising from the diversities 
of terminations which are to be found in other 
languages. 




186 



HINDUSTANI. 



There is a genitive affix which varies accord- 
ing to the gender of the noun following it. Thus, 
the Rajah's son, the Rajah's daughter, and the 
Rajah's houses, would be translated Rajaka, Ra- 
jakl, and Rajake. 

There are several series of words, relating to 
time, place, quantity, &c, which represent now, 
then, when, here, hither, there, thither, where, 
whither, &c. The initial letter of each being 
distinctive, facilitates the acquisition of the whole 
range. 

The tenses are formed with beautiful simpli- 
city, and there are only three irregular verbs in 
the language. 

The nouns have a genitive, a dative, and an 
accusative case, but the two latter are identical. 
In neuter nouns the nominative is employed as 
the accusative, without assuming the affix. Post- 
positions supply all the other contingencies in 
which nouns are employed. 

All the constructions will be found exemplified 
in the appended sentences, with the exception of 
one anomaly, which need not be learned at first. 

The beginner is not to look at the synopsis 
until he has mastered a hundred words; but after 
that, he may study it as much as he pleases. 



187 



HINDUSTANI SENTENCES. 

1 2 3 4567 8_ 9 10 

1. Suno — agar tinke bhai ajke roz char gbanteke andar tiimku 

11 12 13 14 _ _ 15 _. 16 17 18 19 f° 2 l 

nere mile to usku bulabhejkar usse puchho kih apka dost banata 

22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 

so chizka nam kya hai atir uska kharid kitina hai. 

1 2 10 11 12 12 3 4 5—6 9 

1. Hear ! if you do not find (or meet) tbeir brother to-day before 

7 8 15 15 14 15 17 16 15 26 24 23 

four o'clock, send for him and ask him what is the name of the 

23 22 19 20 21 27 30 31 28 19 

article which his friend constructs, and what is its price. 

I 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 

2. Turn hamara gharku jaldi jakar woh naukar sanduk me« 

10 II 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 

rakha so kaghaz atir dd kitabonku wahanse mangakar Bandar mere 

20 21 22 23 24 25 26_ 27 28 _ 29 29 

hai so paltanka Major sahibke pass jahaz par bhejneke waste tayar 

30 

karo. 

5 4 3 2 3 5 17 16 16 12 

2. Go quickly to my house, and procure from thence the paper 

13 14 15 11 6 7 10 9 8 

and the two books which that servant placed in the box, and 

30-31 28 29 27 26 23-24 22 22 21 

prepare them to be sent by ship to the Major of the Regiment which 

20 10 18 

is at Bunder. 

1 2 345678 910 

3. Nadike ustarafse iss khatt lekar aya, so adamlku bulakar usse 

11 12 13 14 15 Ifi 17 _ _ 18 _ 19 20 21 22 

bolo klh aj shamku sade sat ghanteku Jay sahibke pass ham jawab 

23 

bhejenge. 

9 8 7 5-6342 221 

3. Call the man who brought this letter from the other side of 

1 1 9 11 10 12 21 23 23 22 20 19 18 17 

the river, and tell him that I will send an answer to Mr Jay at 

15-16 17 13 14 

half-past six o'clock this evening. 

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 

4. Isske siwai jab tiimku khabar malum hota, hai kih unke lashkar 

12 13 14 15 _ 16 17 18 19 20 21 

uss gaon mere pahuncha hai tab Adjutant sahibka ghorewaleke pass 

22 23 14 25 26 27 :8 29 30 31 32 33 

jakar usse puchho kih ham Sadras mera kharid kiye so ghora, kahan 

34 35 36 37 38 _ 39 10 41 42 _ 43 44 45 

hai aur wahanse kab nikala hai aur itine dinonke der kiss sababse 

46 47 

howi hai. 

2 1 3 4 6-7-8 5 9 10 11 

4. Besides this, when you receive tidings that their detachment 

15-16 14 12 13 17 22 21 lS-19 

has arrived in that village, then go over to the Adjutant's 

20 22 24 23 33 32 34 31 26 29-30 28 

horse-keeper and ask him where the horse is which I bought in 

27 35 37 38-39 36 36 ...40-44-45-41... 41 42 

Sadras, and when he set out from thence, and why so many days' 

43 46-47 

delay has occurred. 



188 



HINDUSTANI PARADIGM, 

OR SYNOPSIS OF THE TERMINATIONS OF ALL THE VARIABLE 
PARTS OF SPEECH. 



mam 

mera — i — e 

mujhku 

mujhe 

tu 

tera 

tujhku 

tujhe 

yih 

Iska — I — e 
lsku 

wtih 

uska — I — e 
usku 

kon 

kiska — I — e 
jo 

jiska — S — e 

so 

tiska — I — e 
kya 

kaheka — I — e 
koi 

klsika — I — e 
kuch 

klsuka — I— e 



ham 

hamara — I — e 
hamku 



turn 

tunihara — I- 
tuinku 



Inka — I — e 
Inku 

we 

unka — I — e 
iinku 

kon 

kiuka— I — e 
jo 

jinka — I — e 
so 

tinka — I — e 
kya 

kaheka — i — e 
sab 

sabho/ika — I— 



apna — i — e 



mard mard 
mardka — I — e mardo?ika — I- 



kitab 

kitabka — I — e 

rotl 

kutta 

gir 

gira— I 
ta— I 



owga — I 
ega— I 
ega— I 



na 

neka — e — I 



hbn 
hai 
haT 



tha— I 



ki tab era 
kltabowka — I- 

rotlyan 
rotiyo«ka 
kutte 
kuttorcka 

giro 



te — In 

en 
5 

en 

enge — in 
oge — in 
ense —In 



kar 

ke 



ham 

ho 

ham 



the— in 



For the pronunciation of the vowels, see page 183. 



CHAPTER XII. 



ON GRAMMAR. 

QOME knowledge of grammar is generally 
^ considered to be an essential preliminary to 
the attainment of a language; but there is no 
dialect that has not been acquired, and spoken in 
idiomatic form by foreign children, without such a 
preparation. 

Cobbett, the grammarian, has proved very con- 
clusively that grammar is extremely and almost 
hopelessly difficult of attainment; for he shows that 
English statesmen, whose eloquence had often 
elicited applause from the most critical assembly 
in the world, were guilty of errors, neither few 
nor venial, even in the studied composition of 
speeches to be delivered from the throne. 

Regarded as a science, grammar is very de- 
ficient in exactitude and consistency, because it 
admits of many exceptions to its general rules; 



190 



ON GRAMMAR. 



and in its universal form it is so meagre and un- 
practical, that there is probably not a language to 
be found, in which some violation of its leading 
principles does not occur. 

There is great ambiguity in the word " gram- 
mar." It is a Protean term, for which it is hard 
to find an unexceptionable definition. 

In our great schools it is held to be the most 
effective, because it is the most complicated method 
of imparting by slow degrees a thorough knowledge 
of two magnificent languages. No attempt is made 
to teach boys to speak Latin and Greek. The 
avowed object is to exercise their understandings 
upon the structure of these languages. They are 
employed in the solution of difficulties in accord- 
ance with those principles with which they are 
supposed to be imbued in the first place, by 
learning the whole grammar by heart. 

Grammar is not the art of teaching languages, 
nor is it the art of learning them, nor is it a device 
for simplifying the art of learning them, for no 
grammarian or lexicographer has so defined it ; 
and yet, through some strange infatuation, this 
virtue is almost universally ascribed to it. 

Incorrect language is generally called u bad 
grammar ; " and thus the terms language and gram- 
mar are confounded. 

Grammar originally signified merely the art 
of writing, and the study of written language. 



ON GRAMMAR. 



191 



During a long course of years it was generally 
defined to be the art of speaking, as well as of 
writing correctly. This definition is unique in 
respect to the last word; and it is very unphilo- 
sophical; because on the one hand correctly is 
precisely equivalent to grammatically, (which 
merely leads us back to our starting point,) and 
on the other, we meet with people quite ignorant 
of grammar, who nevertheless speak and write 
more elegantly than some of those who are con- 
versant with the grammars of several languages. 

Grammar is sometimes defined to be the law 
by which language is regulated; but in reality, 
grammar is deduced from language, and is not the 
regulator, but the regulatee. Locke defines it as 
" the art which teaches us the relations of words 
to each other." But whatever the true definition 
may be, there are hundreds of millions of men 
who have the gift of speech, and who pass their 
lives very pleasantly, without ever hearing of the 
" relations of words to each other ; " and therefore 
it is clear that such knowledge is not essential as 
an introduction to the colloquial acquisition of any 
language. We also know that there are barbarous 
tribes who speak very complicated and highly 
refined languages which, till the present genera- 
tion, never came into the clutches of a gram- 
marian, and in which this recondite science has 
till now been nameless and unknown. 



192 



ON GRAMMAR. 



Grammarians endeavour to induct us into the 
art of constructing correct sentences by reasoning 
processes. But children construct them without 
any such training; and reasoning, when misdi- 
rected, as it generally is in this pursuit, obstructs 
our progress, because it perpetually recalls our 
attention to the forms of our own language, than 
which nothing ought to be more carefully avoided. 

The most powerful reasoners are not the best 
linguists. On the contrary, they are often found 
to be very poor performers. But the reasoning 
faculty, when rightly directed, can never be an 
obstacle to our progress in any pursuit. It is 
only when we misapply it by diverging from the 
true course, that it fails us; and it is only from 
misguidance that men of education are defeated in 
this pursuit; the practical acquisition of language 
being postponed and made subservient to the 
study of grammar. 

Grammars contain from fifty to five hundred 
pages of instruction; but so great is the awe in 
which the writers are held, that no one ventures 
to insinuate that there is any deficiency in the 
smaller, or any superfluity in those on the larger 
scale. But the short grammar looks very like a 
protest against elaborate explanations of points of 
construction, which are upon the level of the capa- 
city of little children. And the preference for the 
shortest grammars, exhibited by those who are in 



ON GRAMMAR. 



193 



the habit of learning languages, implies the con- 
viction in the minds of experienced men, that that 
study is merely a loitering on the threshold. 

Whatever a grammarian thinks fit to propound 
concerning a language, is generally received as 
grammar. In expounding the principles on which 
the constructions seem to him to have been origi- 
nally planned and instituted, it is his prerogative 
to philosophize without restriction, to frame rules 
at his discretion, and to cite examples ad libitum 
to illustrate them, together with exceptions to 
establish them. 

But unfortunately teachers do not discern that 
the examples are in reality the laws, and that 
the syntactical rules are but corollaries drawn 
from them. They make grammar the paramount 
consideration, and treat the language as subordi- 
nate to it, and therefore we protest against them 
as unsuitable guides for beginners who are intent 
upon learning to speak the language. 

When it is conceded that all that emanates 
from the brain of the grammarian is grammar, let 
it be noted that not one word of the language 
sprang from that source, and therefore that every 
word of his paradigms and examples belongs of 
right, not to him, but to the language from 
which he borrowed them. 

It is essential to draw a clear line of distinc- 
tion, not merely between the two words, but 





194 



ON GRAMMAR. 



between the two things, in order to satisfy the 
beginner who adopts this system that he is not 
omitting anything essential when he dispenses with 
a grammarian's assistance. 

There may be a legion of grammarians, each 
with a sound method of his own ; but the language 
of which they treat continues unchanged and unin- 
fluenced by them. Each of them may excel his 
predecessors in some respects ; but there is not one 
amongst them whose rules or opinions are neces- 
sary for the guidance of a foreigner, who is begin- 
ning to learn the language. 

A modern grammar puts us into possession of 
all that is valuable in the researches of former 
grammarians, accompanied by the writers own 
reflections, emendations, and additions. Words 
are classified, facts are stated, technical terms are 
employed and explained, and laws are framed, by 
means of which we are expected to reason about 
words and constructions. The various steps of the 
grammarian's own reasonings are not exhibited ; 
but in the application of the grammar to the study 
of the written language, our teachers are supposed 
to conduct us to the same results, through the same 
course of investigation. 

If, however, they do not fully understand that 
reasoning, or if they possess not the faculty of 
teaching, the principal object is frustrated. The 
rules being practically annulled by their exceptions, 



ON GRAMMAR. 



195 



the study bewilders and perplexes the understanding, 
and it becomes intensely wearisome, except when 
that interest is awakened which it is the province 
of the teacher to impart to every pursuit which 
occupies the attention of youth. When the reason- 
ing powers, however, are baffled, wdien all interest 
has been lost, and harsh tyranny has intervened, 
no progress takes place, except in making a mere 
acquaintance with words and constructions ; and 
the education is virtually suspended. 

As there have been many teachers who could 
not appreciate, and were therefore quite incapable 
of carrying out, the objects of the classical course 
of study, it is no wonder that hundreds of educated 
men, having received in their youth no clear views 
on the subject, feel dissatisfied that their sons must 
be educated according to a system which produced 
such small results in themselves. They think that 
the time is wasted, because the close critical study 
of a language for ten years, does not qualify men 
to speak it, or at least to write it with elegance 
and freedom. They do not see that there is a 
great difference between studying, and acquiring 
a language. To frequent picture galleries in com- 
pany with men of artistic genius, and to hear 
them descant, from day to day, upon the excel- 
lencies and defects of the finest works of art, is 
a course of study, by which the judgment and 
taste are greatly improved and developed; but it 



196 



ON GRAMMAR. 



is not painting, nor will it ever make a man a 
painter, unless he handles a brush and lays on 
colours. In like manner we study Latin and Greek 
for many years, but we are not led on to the 
ultimate " mastery " of them. 

Foreigners wonder why we wilfully and habit- 
ually pretermit the practice of oral composition in 
Latin ; and even our own countrymen, who, being 
accustomed to the phenomenon, ought to be able 
to account for it, are puzzled by the utter incapacity 
of some very good scholars in this respect. 

Grammarians give us most abundant and 
minute information on every point connected with 
the languages which they respectively undertake 
to analyse and delineate ; but it is not a part of 
their programme to qualify us to speak. They 
only provide that, when we do attempt oral com- 
position, we shall be thoroughly furnished with 
the requisite materials and principles. 

Grammar is the only avenue of approach to the 
scientific study of a language, because thereby alone 
can we appreciate and employ those technical terms 
which custom has sanctioned, and has now pre- 
scribed as essential for the philosophical analysis 
and discussion of words and constructions. The 
power of using technical terms is a necessary 
part of science, because it abridges discussion, 
and conduces to precision of speech. But the 
deepest thinkers complain the most loudly of the 



ON GRAMMAR. 



197 



inadequacy of words to produce an identity of 
thought between the writer and the reader. In by- 
gone times, scientific men reasoned with no less 
force than the moderns, without the aid of many 
of the technical terms now in general use. The dis- 
advantage under which they laboured was, that 
they were forced to express themselves more dif- 
fusely. Economy in the use of words is invaluable, 
but, in the instruction of youth, perspicuity ought 
not to be sacrificed for the sake of conciseness. 
When there is no clear appreciation of the technical 
terms of grammar on the part of the learner, time 
is lost, and progress is arrested. 

Grammar is the scientific point of view of a lan- 
guage ; but when we desire to learn it colloquially 
we must take the practical view also. The techni- 
calities of grammar obstruct the learner's progress, 
because it requires, firstly, a course of study to 
understand them; secondly, of habituation to use 
them with facility ; and thirdly, of thought and 
experience to apply them correctly. Grammar 
itself is at the same time a foreign language, and 
an extremely abstruse science. Uneducated people 
should therefore pass it by, when they want to 
speak a new language. But educated men, who 
already possess a good knowledge of grammar, 
must also abstain from the study, because they 
need only to receive Latin, Greek, and English 
translations of foreign sentences to qualify them to 



198 



ON GRAMMAR. 



understand, at first sight, all forms of speech 
which are analogous to those familiar constructions. 
Those anomalous forms, some of which baffle the 
subtlety of even the most learned men, ought not 
to occupy the attention of the beginner. The 
only sound principle is to adopt them first, and 
study them afterwards. 

The most inexplicable idioms are employed with 
equal propriety by the child, and by the professor; 
and it is not less logical and philosophical to say, 
" What is the foreign word for him ? " than to ask 
for the accusative case, singular number, mascu- 
line gender, of the third personal pronoun. Again : 
we may say, Translate " Ye would have been 
flogged" instead of asking for the second person 
plural of the preterpluperfect tense indicative 
mood of the passive voice of the active transitive 
verb to flog. Science delights in the use of those 
twenty technical terms, but the plain questions are 
more intelligible and more practical. 

The interdict laid upon translations, and every 
kind of assistance to boys in our schools, betrays 
that there is a more direct way of becoming prac- 
tically acquainted with the classical languages. 
However, no public avowal of this fact escapes 
from the lips or pens of our teachers, because 
they maintain the theory that knowledge which has 
been attained without the regular scientific course 
of study, is mere ignorance in disguise. 



ON GRAMMAR. 



199 



There is no disparagement of classical educa- 
tion conveyed in the declaration that a previous 
knowledge of grammar is unnecessary to fit us 
for the colloquial acquisition of any language, how- 
ever complicated it may be. The study of Latin 
and Greek is a most admirable contrivance as an 
instrument of education, when a competent teacher 
and an earnest pupil are brought together. And 
this method, which shows how a valuable accom- 
plishment may be gained by adults, without put- 
ting forth any intellectual effort, will be found to 
be quite in harmony with the classical course. 

The priority which this scheme gives to the 
colloquial element changes the whole aspect of the 
question ; because hitherto oral composition has 
not been the first, but the last step. 

The strength of the classical system consists in 
the analytical examination of written language. 
The pupil is expected to show how the arrange- 
ment of the words, their orthography, their etymo- 
logy, and their variations of case, tense, gender, 
number, and person, conform to that code of laws 
which grammarians have deduced from the usage 
of the best writers. 

Grammar is the foundation of that system. 
It is a complicated contrivance for making 
language a scientific study. The pupil is ex- 
pected to bring a clear and thorough comprehension 
of all the minutest details of grammar to his 



200 



ON GRAMMAR. 



analysis of the written language ; and this process 
tests, while it is supposed to improve, his knowledge 
of grammar. 

Latin is the instrument through which he 
studies grammar; while at the same time grammar 
is the instrument through which he studies Latin. 
But studying a language is not acquiring it ; and 
there is no limit to the refinements of grammar. 
The study of that science as the instrument of 
acquisition being interminable, the acquisition itself 
is hopelessly deferred. 

Amongst continental scholars, the power of 
speaking Latin is held to be an essential part 
of the classical course. An excellent plain style 
is often attained at an early stage, for they are 
not expected nor encouraged to employ oratorical 
language, and they do not affect it. The con- 
sequence is, that when they have occasion to speak 
before scholars of high classical reputation, they 
are in a better position, and are more likely to 
acquit themselves well, than those who have not 
practised oral composition at all. 

The most obvious and convincing proof of 
a thorough knowledge of the anatomy of any 
language, is the exhibition of promptitude and 
precision in oral composition. Thus alone can it 
be ascertained whether a free command over all 
the constructions has become habitual. If it has 
not become habitual, and almost natural, it is of 



ON GRAMMAR. 



201 



comparatively little value. Written translations 
yield no conclusive evidence even of a good style 
of writing, because they afford time for the com- 
poser to deliberate, to revise, and to refer every 
word to some precedent. Style is the result of 
habit, and those who do not practise, cannot have 
a fixed style. 

But oral composition finds no place in our 
classical education ; and the custom is to practise 
the demolition and pulverization of sentences, with 
a view to the microscopic examination of each 
atom, and the rehearsal of the laws to which 
they are subject. 

But some rules are obscure ; and some con- 
structions are inexplicable ; and precedents are 
in conflict with each other ; and there are some 
points respecting which the learned are at variance ; 
and when the pupil misunderstands them, his 
foundation is unsound, and the superstructure must 
be unsightly and faulty. One fertile source of 
misconception and error, is the impression conveyed 
by the grammar that the language is perfect, being 
in exact conformity with the laws of pure reason. 

However, when the whole of the rules are 
thoroughly understood by the learner, his intel- 
lectual faculties are beneficially exercised in dis- 
secting, in classifying, and in generalising ; in the 
use of technical terms, in the application of prin- 
ciples, and in the power of systematic investigation, 



202 



ON GRAMMAR. 



by logical analysis. At the same time he becomes 
familiar with the noble sentiments, and the sublime 
language of the great orators, poets, and philo- 
sophers of old. As it is needless to point out the 
benefits of such a course of study, so it would be 
absurd to call them in question. 

But there are many people who have adopted 
the notion that the high attainments of our clas- 
sical scholars, prove that their method and their 
course of study are the best for acquiring a modern 
language. They omit all considerations of the 
time required to carry them through such a 
course. They wilfully shut their eyes to that 
manifest and unquestionable superiority which is 
displayed by children in respect to readiness in 
the composition of idiomatic sentences ; and they 
shrink from a comparison which shivers their 
theory to atoms, and exposes the futility of their 
endeavours to attain a colloquial use of a language, 
through the circuitous course of studying a very 
rough science. 

Not knowing the process by which children 
learn to frame idiomatic sentences, people have 
recourse to one founded upon diametrically opposite 
principles. This being generally accepted as an 
improvement on the course of nature, has been 
adopted to the total subversion and suppression 
thereof. Theory has been permitted to take prece- 
dence of, and to preponderate over practice, almost 



ON GRAMMAR. 



203 



to its exclusion. Let the practical, therefore, 
assume its right position, and let theory be kept 
in due subordination. 

Every rule of syntax is a generalization from 
a series of uniform expressions. It declares in 
scientific terms that the words appear in that 
specific form, for certain ingeniously invented 
reasons; but in reality the true reason in every 
instance is, that the usage of the language requires 
it. Usage is the only law. Usage constitutes the 
whole code. A rule merely enunciates a fact, 
which no prior reasoning on the part of a foreigner 
could possibly have discovered, and regarding 
which no ulterior reasoning can be of any avail. 
In syntax the rules are not connected with each 
other ; the order of their arrangement is purely 
arbitrary throughout ; and they do not form a 
chain of reasoning. 

It is as easy to learn elegant as inelegant 
phraseology by heart; and the construction of new 
sentences, according to a model committed to 
memory, is an extremely simple operation even 
to the illiterate. As example is better than pre- 
cept, let us discard the inferior article altogether. 
Let the beginner commit to memory some collo- 
quial sentences, framed or selected so as to 
exemplify those laws of language which gram- 
marians present to us under the denomination of 
rules of syntax. When the learner has proved his 



204 



ON GRAMMAR. 



intelligent appreciation of the principles on which 
the first sentence is constructed, by composing, 
with different sets of words, ten or twelve sen- 
tences precisely in accordance therewith, there can 
be no necessity for him to commit to memory the 
grammarian's scientific precepts. And if he will 
daily practise the composition of new sentences, 
precisely corresponding to each of the models which 
he has thus learned to copy, there can be no danger 
of his ever forgetting how to construct them. 

Thus a practical command over a language, 
founded upon an accurate knowledge of its struc- 
ture, may be gradually acquired, without the 
labour of learning any technical terms or formal 
rules; and the pupil who diligently exercises 
himself in oral composition, with the models en- 
graved on his memory, and a complete paradigm 
of all the verbs, nouns, and pronouns always lying 
open before him, acquires the habit of expressing 
himself fluently and accurately, without looking 
into a grammar. Moreover, he shows himself to 
be in possession of the analytical process practised 
in our schools ; because when he makes an intel- 
ligent application of his models, by fluently com- 
posing new sentences exactly corresponding to 
them, he surpasses his comrades in constructive 
skill, as far as he who can separate, and then 
reunite all the parts of a watch, excels those who 
can only take it to pieces. 



ON GRAMMAR. 



205 



Language existed long before grammar was 
invented, and the faculty of acquiring a foreign 
tongue by imitation, and of speaking it exactly 
as the natives do, is innate and universal in man- 
kind. It is not a science, nor does it depend on 
the acquisition of any science. 

The colloquial command of a living language 
is of the highest utility to a traveller, however 
ignorant he may be of scientific grammar ; but the 
most profound knowledge of the grammar, without 
some practical command over the language, appears 
in many instances to operate as a disqualification 
for the colloquial attainment. This incongruous 
conjunction of profundity with incompetency, which 
is very common in England, is a stumbling block 
to beginners. One youth shrinks from under- 
taking that which has foiled his betters, while 
another is furnished with an argument against 
the introductory study of grammar, which his 
teacher overrules, and denounces in the most 
emphatic terms, although he does not and cannot 
refute it. 

Grammar and logic have been called twin 
sciences, and the term is not inapplicable, because 
the diiference between them is sometimes undis- 
tinguishable. As logic does not profess to endow 
us with the power of reasoning, but only to show 
us a process whereby we may acquire the habit 
of reasoning correctly, that is, according to rules 



206 



ON GRAMMAR. 



prescribed by logicians ; so grammar " does not pro- 
fess to endow us with the power of speaking,'' but 
only to show us how we may acquire the habit of 
speaking correctly, or according to rules invented 
by grammarians. 

The definition of grammar as the art of 
speaking correctly, being generally accepted, has 
given rise to the tradition that it is impossible to 
speak a language correctly except by that study. 
Now the rules of syntax are drawn from certain 
sentences, and these are given as examples to 
prove that the rules have been logically deduced. 
The pupil first learns a rule, which is proved by 
examples, and then in the course of his studies he 
meets with the examples, which are proved in 
their turn by the rules. He then begins to see 
that he has only been galloping round a heavy 
course, and has come back to the starting-post. 

The grammarian theorizes for our instruction 
in his science, and he gives us the materials for 
attaining a critical knowledge of the language. 
But a child obtains a practical knowledge of a 
foreign tongue without theorizing at all, and yet 
he unconsciously conforms to abstruse and scientific 
rules. Total ignorance of the science is no bar to 
his attainment of the most complicated language, 
and it need be no impediment to the progress of 
an adult. 

The lovers of routine consider that it is very 



ON GRAMMAR. 



207 



contemptible to learn to speak a foreign language, 
without knowing the why and wherefore, and 
without learning to read and write. But in the 
first place usage is the only reason for every thing ; 
and in the second place a free-born Briton is not 
to be coerced. He will not work more than is 
absolutely requisite, during a short pleasure-ex- 
cursion ; he will not begin a study which will cost 
him time and toil; nor will he be led by those who, 
though they can read and write to admiration, and 
have a profound knowledge of the grammar, yet 
have not the power of bringing their learning into 
practical effect in the most ordinary conversation. 

But to resume the parallel. In reasoning, 
soundness is the main point; and in speaking 
foreign tongues, idiomatic diction, But soundness 
of judgment and idiomatic speech, are found in 
people altogether untaught. Logic and grammar 
instruct the beginner gradually in the art of 
detecting, by critical revision, the fallacies in his 
own reasonings, and the errors in his own composi- 
tions; but they do not, at the outset, help him 
to originate. He cannot reason and compose cor- 
rectly, till he has gone through the prescribed 
course ; and even when it is completed, his per- 
formances betray that he is not armed at all 
points. 

To speak a language correctly, after a long series 
of laborious efforts in composing, revising, and 



208 



ON GRAMMAR. 



recomposing, is a very bumble achievement, seeing 
that children accomplish it per saltum, and exceed 
it too, by speaking idiomatically. But to speak a 
language otherwise than idiomatically, is to speak 
it imperfectly. Now grammar, according to its 
usual definition, does not even profess to teach us 
to speak idiomatically ; and we find some men, 
deeply versed in grammar, who speak very 
uncouthly. 

But children speak idiomatically without learn- 
ing any grammar, and as we have shown that 
adults may do likewise, we contend that the study 
of grammar is extraneous, and unnecessary for 
beginners, and that every correct sentence uttered 
by an uneducated man supports this assertion. 

There are thousands of Englishmen who know 
the Latin and French grammars thoroughly, and 
can interpret the best authors, who are neverthe- 
less incapable of speaking those languages, and 
who stand aghast when suddenly called upon to 
converse. 

Experience shows that the power of composing 
colloquial sentences with fluency, does not spring 
from a thorough knowledge of grammar; nor from 
deep and extensive critical acquaintance with the 
best authors ; nor from learning thousands of 
detached words by heart; nor from treasuring up 
choice passages from the poets and orators in the 
memory ; nor from any or all of those combined : 



ON GRAMMAR. 



209 



and yet we daily see highly intellectual men, who 
are not insane in any other respect, preparing 
themselves for a continental tour, by a ruthless 
vivisection of the languages of Europe. They 
well know that this is not the right course, but 
they object to other methods, as being merely the 
old system in disguise. 

On the other hand, illiterate people and chil- 
dren acquire the power of speaking the most diffi- 
cult languages with fluency, by learning a very few 
practical sentences, and by ringing the changes on 
them. As speech is nothing but a succession 
of sentences, this is the natural and rational 
course. It is also the simplest and most effective. 
Children and imbeciles succeed, in spite of their 
ignorance of grammar and books ; and highly 
educated men fail in consequence of their enter- 
taining the delusion that a course of grammar, 
and familiarity with books, and an acquaintance 
with an unlimited number of words, are essential 
preliminaries. Hence it happens that the accom- 
plished gladiator of the Imperial Circus is often 
defeated in his own arena by an untrained rustic. 

The beginner, in whose classical education oral 
composition has not been practised, will meet with 
nothing but disappointment, unless he pursues a 
different course in learning a living language. 
When a man has committed to memory a few 
well selected sentences, each containing different 

p 



210 



ON GRAMMAR. 



constructions, and has acquired the power of putting 
them together in all their variations, one rapid 
perusal of the grammar will suffice to convince 
him that he is already in possession of the whole 
syntax of the language. Then will that fluency 
in speaking foreign tongues, which is too generally 
allowed to be dormant, become rapidly developed 
within him ; and together with the power of con- 
necting words with exactness and readiness, he 
will attain that self-possession, the want of which 
strikes many Englishmen dumb, when they first 
have occasion to speak to foreigners. 

The siege of Troy lasted for ten years, and our 
classical education often occupies a longer period; 
but the moderns generally demolish a fortress 
within a few weeks, and the stronghold of a living 
language, if persistently assailed at the right point 
of attack, may be overpowered in the same space 
of time. 

It is a waste of labour to travel through the 
wildernesses of Latin or Sanscrit lore, as a prepara- 
tion for learning minor languages. While one 
youth is struggling through a twelve-months' study 
of Latin, another may easily learn to speak both 
French and Spanish, and if they then begin Italian 
together, he who has devoted his time to grammar, 
parsing, and translating from Latin into English, 
will be left far behind ; because his competitor is 
already perfectly familiar with that set of Latin 



ON GRAMMAR. 



211 



words, which is generally current in all the 
cognate languages, and he has them ready on the 
tip of his tongue. Moreover his practical training 
has especially qualified him for the undertaking ; 
whereas the attention of the other has been 
drawn to different objects, his memory has not 
been vigorously exercised in reproducing and re- 
arranging what he has acquired, and his delibera- 
tive method is hostile to the readiness required for 
colloquial progress. 

On the other hand, no benefit can result from 
learning Latin first, except in training the intel- 
lect. But fortunately for mankind in general, 
intellectual vigour is not required in this pursuit. 
Every construction which is identical in the two 
languages will be learned equally well in Italian, 
and the memory will thus be relieved from learning 
two sets of words and rules ; and every syntactical 
rule in Latin which is not common to both will 
occasion delay, and will be of no use. A con- 
struction is not difficult to a learner, merely 
because the grammarian cannot reconcile it with 
scientific principles, and there is no form of speech 
which is not acquired and accurately employed by 
foreign children. 

When learning foreign tongues, Englishmen 
are often more impeded than benefited by their 
knowledge of Latin and Greek. Anomalous con- 
structions, which puzzle them and check their 



212 



ON GRAMMAR. 



progress, produce no such effect on those who have 
been differently trained. The former, believing in 
the perfection of the classical system, and in the 
infallibility of the great principles of grammar, 
which they regard as the true solvent of all diffi- 
culties, are not content to receive an anomaly as a 
fact, uncouth perhaps, but yet unavoidable and 
indispensable. They do not adopt it cheerfully, 
and reserve it for ulterior investigation; but they 
demur, and leave it as a stumbling-block in their 
own path. Many good scholars are utterly and 
irretrievably confounded by the following French 
construction, which seems to them to defy all the 
proprieties : " The letter which you sent yester- 
day/' " Epistola quod tu heri transmissam hahes;" 
" The books which he gave me," " Libri quod mini 
datos habet." They are told that the French word 
for quod represents also all the cases and genders 
of the relative pronoun, and that they must men- 
tally substitute quarn in the first sentence, and 
quos in the second; but still the construction 
appears to be indefensible, because there is no 
precedent for it in Latin. But if they will look 
homewards, they will find an analogous form of 
speech, whenever a man declares that he knows a 
French lesson, merely because u he has said it," 
perhaps a month ago. This is the virulent 
epidemic fallacy which cuts off thousands of 
aspiring young linguists, and for the cure of which 



ON GRAMMAR. 



2 13 



we recommend homoeopathic treatment with infini- 
tesimal doses of words. To learn a lesson perfectly 
is not the end. It is merely a preliminary step to 
obtaining the " mastery " over the words. 

Our classical system studiously excludes and 
anathematizes all colloquial profanations of Latin 
and Greek. Its votaries also exhibit a repugnance 
and contempt for other languages, which become 
aggravated when they see the rapid and unde- 
niable success of men of inferior education and 
capacity. 

Such feelings spring from the conviction that 
the critical knowledge obtained at school and 
college, is far greater and higher than the collo- 
quial command of words. Yet, as the greater 
does not include the minor accomplishment, and 
they cannot see clearly how it leads to it, they 
secretly mistrust their own conclusions. They 
manifest great diffidence when invited to translate 
a few lines impromptu into Latin or Greek. The 
truth is, as some candidly avow, that they are 
afraid of committing grammatical errors. 

According to the classical theory, a partial or 
incomplete knowledge of grammar is useless. One 
trifling mistake gives a shock to a classical reputa- 
tion. The standard is too high. It is unattain- 
able and unapproachable by those who never make 
an attempt, except with their pen, to reach it. 
Even among those who have a thorough knowledge 



214 



ON GRAMMAR. 



of Latin and Greek grammar, there are very 
few who can speak those languages readily, and 
there is little disposition on the part of scholars 
in general to admit that it would be a step in 
advance of their existing attainments. Never- 
theless they would be very glad to find themselves 
in possession of the power of composing vivd voce, 
as accurately and elegantly as they can write the 
classical languages; but they regard the propo- 
sition as visionary, and they will not entertain it. 

There was a time when it was deemed impos- 
sible, except for a few highly gifted individuals, 
to shoot birds flying; and the same sort of feeling 
makes every one look askance at the suggestion 
for making oral composition in Latin a common 
attainment. The bugbear of colloquial familiari- 
ties and Latinized slang might, as of old, be 
invoked with success against so dangerous an 
innovation ; but this in reality is a mere begging 
of the question. There is a lurking apprehension 
that oral composition would expose the hollowness 
of a great deal of very good-looking scholarship. 
On the other hand, the discovery that the showy 
accomplishment of the linguist is always symp- 
tomatic of a deficiency of brains, is greatly 
applauded. The honour of confuting this asser- 
tion is reserved for some man of unquestionable 
capacity; but in the meantime it will be proved 
that oral composition is within the power of 



ON GRAMMAR. 



215 



every beginner who " masters " a few practical 
sentences. 

The time seems to have come for the determi- 
nation of the question, how far the positive acqui- 
sition of Latin and Greek ought to be exacted in 
our public schools. Oral composition is the prac- 
tical application of the principles of grammar to 
the words that we know, whether it be done uncon- 
sciously through imitation and repetition, or con- 
sciously through grammar and repetition. In 
either case it must be commenced with the employ- 
ment of a few words. It is easier to learn 
sentences intelligently by heart, than to apply 
principles; and the power of framing sentences 
fluently affords the soundest proof of a thorough 
knowledge of principles. It seems to have escaped 
attention that language has a power of explaining 
and revealing itself, far beyond the conceptions of 
those who have never committed obscure passages 
to memory very perfectly, with a view to diligently 
employing the involved constructions in oral com- 
position. The manner in which foreign languages 
develop themselves in children, is calculated to 
elicit our admiration ; but we involuntarily observe 
the defects and the drolleries more than the felicity 
with which they use words, the meaning of which 
has never been explained to them, and construc- 
tions, of which the principles are far beyond their 
comprehension. In a scholastic point of view that 



216 



ON GRAMMAR. 



knowledge has not been legitimately attained. 
There remains therefore the important question, 
whether boys should be restrained from obtaining 
such knowledge in Latin, concurrently with the 
usual scholastic course. 

The system here recommended is equally 
suited for all languages, whether living or dead. 
But the latter term is no more applicable to a 
language than to a neglected musical instrument. 
So long as it remains cast aside, it is mute; but 
when touched by a master-hand, it will discourse 
most excellent music. As far as Latin and Greek 
are concerned, we do not cast them aside; but so 
long as we occupy ourselves in merely pulling 
those noble instruments to pieces, we cannot rea- 
sonably expect to be able to use them. 



CHAPTER XIII. 



ON BOOK-WOUK. 

HTHERE are many individuals who have attained 
a goodly reputation as linguists on very easy 
terms, by reading foreign books with translations. 
In cognate languages, wherein many words are 
identical, there is so little difficulty in this process 
that the restrictions here proposed will probably 
be regarded as superfluous. But even to those 
who have had a classical education the limitations 
are essential. 

Dull and dismal as the study may be con- 
sidered by the majority of mankind, it rapidly 
recommends itself to those who undertake it 
with due consideration for the fickleness of the 
memory. It is much easier to recognise and 
understand what is placed before the eyes, than to 
reproduce words from memory, and therefore the 
progress in reading will necessarily be faster than 



218 



ON BOOK-WORK. 



in talking. On the supposition that the sole object 
of the learner is to become acquainted with the 
literature of another language, whether ancient or 
modern, the following plan is recommended : 

Let the learner select some interesting narra- 
tive, in which no poetry or colloquy is introduced, 
and let him employ a friend to mark with figures 
the passage selected to be read first. The num- 
bers will show which of the words correspond to 
each other in the translation into his own lan- 
guage. 

No lesson should exceed fifteen minutes in 
length, nor should more than twenty new words, 
even in a cognate language, be studied at one 
time. In those of a different order, such as Welsh 
or Polish, a much smaller number will suffice. 

The first lesson, being the basis, should be very 
carefully studied, and recapitulated in conjunction 
with its followers for several days in succession. 

Two lessons a day, with an interval of four 
or five hours between them, will yield ample 
results, especially if intermediate recapitulations 
be adopted. The principle to be observed in fixing 
the number of words, is to make the work extremely 
easy for the memory, and to reduce it in each lesson, 
if the test shows that the memory has failed or 
faltered in it. This exercise will so effectually 
familiarize the eye to the foreign words, that when 
they are written on separate slips of paper, and 



ON BOOK-WORK. 



219 



drawn out of a bag, the meaning of each will occur 
to the recollection instantaneously. This perfection 
ought to be attained in each lesson ; and a new one 
is not to be undertaken unless the test has been 
rigorously applied just before beginning it. To 
apply it at the end of a lesson is of no use 
whatever. 

The foreign w T ords must not be even muttered 
by the student. The eye is to perform the whole 
operation. But if in its restless activity, it 
wanders away amongst a mass of other words, 
imperfect impressions will inevitably be made upon 
the memory, and these will produce confusion, 
distraction, and disgust. This danger may be 
averted by writing out one lesson at a time, and 
no more; by then laying aside the book; and by 
refraining from looking into it at other times. 
The paper on which the lessons are consecutively 
written should be employed in its stead, and the 
more the eye wanders over that, the more perfect 
will be the recollection of its contents. A casual 
perusal of the book vitiates the experiment as to 
the power of the memory. 

If the learner thinks that his time will be well 
employed in learning some hundreds of words by 
sight in one month, let the experiment be fairly 
made, without modification of any kind. At the 
end of that period, he may read unrestrictedly; 
and if he will resort to frequent recapitulations 



220 



ON BOOK-WORK. 



rapidly conducted, and use translations instead of 
dictionaries, he will make great progress. 

To French people reading English, and vice 
versa, this process will be found very easy and 
efficacious, because a great number of words are 
identical in the two languages; and the similarity 
of their constructions in narrative composition is 
such, that many lines in every page may be trans- 
lated word for word, in the order in which they 
stand. 

It must never be forgotten that the memory is 
the chief agent. To the understanding the work 
is as nothing. When one lesson is left unfinished, 
it is unreasonable to expect to make up for it 
in a new one. Time lost must be redeemed; and 
what is left incomplete to-day must be resumed 
to-morrow. 

If these rules are followed, there never will 
pass a day in which the learner will not be con- 
scious of an augmentation of his knowledge. But 
the scheme will be treated with injustice, unless 
the experiments are carried so far as to obtain 
some familiarity with all the ordinary construc- 
tions. 

Those who have good assistance will perhaps 
learn more pleasantly than others; but that is 
no reason why they should go on faster. If they 
listen to explanations and dissertations, they 
will be led out of the prescribed limits, and 



ON BOOK-WORK. 



221 



lose both the benefit that accrues from allowing 
the language to reveal itself, and the pleasure 
which results from self-instruction. No teacher 
can impart the knowledge and power which are 
acquired by unassisted exertions. 

Owing to the continual reappearance of the 
commonest words, this exercise will be found to 
afford a much more extensive acquaintance with 
the language than might at first sight be anti- 
cipated. At the end of a few days, the bulk of 
each lesson will be greatly increased. But words 
that are not quite identical with those previously 
encountered, are not to be treated as old ones. 
When there is the slightest difference in spelling, 
they must be reckoned amongst the new ones; 
because every affix and prefix constitutes a sepa- 
rate word, although the orthographical system may 
render them in one sense inseparable. 



1 

DIAGRAM, exhibiting j 



1 2 
His servants 



3 
saw 



4 

your 



b 

friend's 



6 
new 



7 

bag 



° j 19 
i^J their 



20 
carriage. 



/ 



E 



1 .2.3.4.5] 1.2. 3. 4. 5 .6.7] 1. 2.3.4.6.7) 1.2.3.4.5, 
1.2.3.4.7 | 1.2.3.9. 10 | 1.2.3.4.5.7 | 1.2.3.4.0. 8.9.10 | 



-113.14.17 



1L2.3.4.5 j 11.2.3.4.5.6.7 | 11 .2.3.4.6.7 | 11.2.3.4.5 



1.19.20 



11 .2 



4.7 



9.10 | 11.2.3.4.5.7 | 11.2.3.4 



9. 10 — 



1.12.3.4.5.6.7 | 1 . 12.3 .4. 6. 7 | 1 . 12 . 3 . 4 . 5 . 10 | 1 . 12 .3.4. 



1.12 3.9.10 | 1.12.3.4.5.7 J 1.12.3.4.5.8.9.10 | 1.12.3.4.7.8.9 



14 . 15 



1.2.13.4.5.6.7 | 1.2.13.4.6.7 | 1.2.13.4.5.10 | 1.2.13.4.10 | 



13.14.20 



1 .2.13.9.10 | 1.2.13.4.5.7 | 1 ■ 2 . 13 . 4 . 5 . 8 . 9 . 10 | 1 . 2 . 13 .1 
1 . 2 . 3 . 14 . 5 | 1 . 2 . 3 . 14 . 5 ■ 6 . 7 | 1 . 2 . 3 . 14 . 6 . 7 | 1 . 2r 
1.2.3.14.10 | 1.2.3.14.7 j 1.2.3.19.10 | 1 . 2 \- 



U 19.20 



14.16.17 



19. 20 



19 . 20 



1 . 2 . 3 . 14 . 5 . 8 . 9 . 10 | 1 . 2 . 3 . 14 . 7 . 8. 9 . 10 [ 1 . 2 . 3 . 4 . 15 |jj -y^ 
|l . 2 ■ 3 . 4 . 16 . 7 [ 1 ■ 2 . 3 . 4 . 15 ■ 10 | 1 . 2 . 3 . 4 . 20 | 1 . 2 . 3 . 4 . | ' 



5. 17 



1 . 2 . 3 . 4 . 15 . 17 [ 1 . 2 . 3 . 4 . 15 . 8 . 9 . 10 | 1 . 2 . 3 . 4 . 17. 8. 9.10 

I. 2.3.4.6.17 1 11.12.3.4.5 | 11.12.3.4.5.6.7 [ 11 . 12 . 3 . 4 . 6 . 7 | 11 . b -^ ' 

II. 12.3.4.10 | 11.12.3.4.7 | 11.12.3.9.10 | 11.12.3.4.5.7 | 11. 



11.12.3.4.7 



9. 10 | 1.12.13.4.5 | 1.12.13.4.5.6.7 | 1 



1.12.13.4.5.10 | 1.12.13.4.10 | 1.12.13.4.7 | 1.12.13.9.10 | l.\ u lfi ? 
1.12.13.4.5.8.9.10 | 1.12.13.4.7.8.9.10 [ 1.2.13.14.5 | ^ JT^ 
1 . 2 . 13 . 14 . 6 . 7 | 1 . 2 . 13 . 14 . 5 . 10 | 1 . 2 . 13 . 14 . 10 | 1 . 2 . 13 . fr j-^ ' 
1.2.3.14.15 | 1.2.3.14.15.16.17 | 1.2.3.14.16.17 | 1.2.3.14.15.20 | 1.2.3.l[j^ 



I. 2.3.4.20 | 1.2.3.4.15.18.19.20 | 1.2.3.4.17.18.19.20 | 1.12.3.14.5 | l 1 ^- 

II. 2.13.4.15 | 11.2.13.4.15.6.17 | 11.2.13.4.16.7 | 11.2.13.4.15.10 | ll-Sj^J^ 

1.2.3.4.5.6.7.8.19.10 [ 1.2.3.4.5.6.7.18.9.10 | 1.2.3.4.5.6.17.8.9.10 | 1.2.3^7o .90 



11.12.13.14.15.16.17.8.19.20 | 11.12.13.14.15 16.7.18.19.20 | 11.12.1 



.18.9.10 



I. 12.13.14.15.16.17.18.19.20 | 11.12.3.4.5.6.7.8.9.10 | 11.12.13.4.5.6. 

II. 12.13.14.15.16.17.18.19.10 | 1.2.13. 14. 15.16.17.18.19.20 | 1.2.3.1-^y^ 
1.12.13.4.5.6.7.8.9.10 | 1.2.13.14.5.6.7.8.9.10 j 1.2.3.14.15.6.7.8.9.10 



18.19.20 



11.12.3.4.15.16.17.18.19.20 | 11.12.13.4.5.16.17.18.19.20 | 11 12.13.14.5.? ^-^ 



11.12.13.14.15.16.17.18.9.20 | 11. 2.3.4.15.16.17. 18.19.20 | 11.12.3,4.5.16^-^- 



I. 2.3.4.15.16.17.18.19.20 | 11. 2.3.4.5. 16.17.18.19.20 | 11.12.13.4 5.6.7r^ ^ 

II. 12.3.4.5.6. 7. 1S.19.20 | 11.12.13.4.5.6.7.8.19.20 | 11.12.13.14.5.6.7.8.9.^ 1 ^ : y' 



1.5.3.4.6.7.8.9.10 | 1.5.3.4.7.8.9.10 | 1.5.3.4.7 | 1.5.3.9.7 | 4.2.3.9.10 1 



9.2.3.4.5.6.10 | 4.2.3.4.5.6.10 | 4.2.3.4.5.6.7 | 4.2.3.9.7.8.9.5.10 | 1.2.3.9^ 



6.7 



19.5.3.4.6.10 | 19.5.3.4.6.7 | 11.5.3 9.10 [ 19.5.3.4.7.8.9.10 | 19.2.3.^-^ 
1.15.3.4 7.8.9.10 1 1.15.3.4.7 j 1.15.3.9.7 ] 4.12.3.9.10 | 9.15.3.4.6.7.r^77- 7 



9.12.3.4.5.6.10 | 4.12.3.4.5.6.10 [ 4.12.3.4.5.6.7 | 4.12.3.9.7.8.9.5.10^ -^ 
9.2.13.4.6.7 | 9.5.13.4.6.10 ] 9.5.13.4.6.7 \ 1.5.13.9.10 [ 9.5AZAJ.8.9AQ^J () 



1.5.3.14.6.7.8 9.10 | 1.5.3.14.7.8.9.10 j 1.5.3.14.7 [ 1.5.3.19.7 | 4.2.3.t ^ 



.10 



9.2.3.19.5.6.7 | 9.2.3.14.5.6.10 | 4 2.3.14.5.6.10 [ 4.2.3.14.5.6.7 [ 4. t R 9 1Q 
9.2.3.4.16.10 1 9.5.3.4.16.7 j 1.5.3.9.20 | 9.5.3.1.17.8.9.10 | 9.2.3.4. l[r^ 1 f n 



1 1.15.3.4.7.8.9.10 1 11.15.3.4.7 [ 11.15.3 .9.7 | 14.12.3.9.10 | I9.15.3.4.6.'^ 7-^ 

ved 



Each figure in the Diagram represents that wore 

as a variation from the twenty words. 

The remainder of the Evolutions would fill fifty 
A Metaholical Apparatus, for presenting to the 

from sight, will be found described at the end of this w<f 



63 



CHAPTER XIV. 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 

rPHIS labyrinth, or wilderness of words, is put 
- forth to show the extraordinary expansibility 
of sentences, and to meet the objections of those 
who despise small beginnings, and set a high value 
on lists of unconnected words. The Hebrews use 
the phrase mid 1 bar dbarim to signify " wilderness 
of words." The former term is derived from the 
latter, and the combination is eminently expressive. 

The diagram indicates the scope of the exercise 
afforded to foreigners by committing two sentences 
to memory, and then proceeding to " master " 
them. For this purpose a few of the variations 
must be translated for them; and in changing 
the words from singular to plural, and from 
masculine to feminine, and vice versa, the com- 
prehensiveness of the English forms will be dis- 
cerned by comparison. The greater number of 



THE LABYRINTH. 
DIAGRAM, exhibiting a few of the Evolutions of Two Sentences of Ten Words each. 



1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 

His servants saw your friend's new bag near our house. Her cousins found my sister's little book in their carriage. 





A — Minor Combinations or Subdivisions 


11.15.1 51 I.15| 11 15,1 , 1 1.15,15.17 1 11.15.1 .11.15,59 1 11,15.1 


14.201 11.12.13.14.1- 




of the two Sentences. 


11.12.13.19.20. | 11.12.13.14.15.17 | 11.12.13.14.15.18.19.20 | 1 


12.13.14.17.18.19.20 


.1.2.3.4.'' ' " J' i-7—,-fj f '., U ',"r'v , 1 '.r"-r~)~' 


B — Interchanges of those Subdivisions. 






1.12.13.14.20 | 1.12.13.14.17 | 1.12.13.19.20 | 




11 ,2.3^4,7.8. J. 10 | 11 ■■ . 1 . ^ i 12 3 47 


C Interchanges of the two Primary 




| 11.2.13.14.15 




Sentences, containing ten words 




5.20 | U.2.18.14.20 






11.2.13.14.17 | 11.2.13.19.20 | 11.2.13.14.15.17 | 11.2. 






D — Transpositions of the two Primary 
Sentences and of their Inter- 


11. 2. 13. 14.17. IS. 13. 20 | 11.12.3.14.15 ] 11.12.3.14.15.11 


17 | 11.12.3.14.10.17 






| 11.12.3.19.20 






3.14.17.18.19.20 


1.2.3.14.5.8.9. 10 | 1 .2.3. 14.7.8.9.10 | 1.2.3.4. 15 | L.2.8.4.16.G.7 


changes. 






1. 2. 3. 4. 16. 7 | 1.2.3.4.15.10 | 1 . 2 . 3 . 4 . 20 | 1 . 2 . 3 . 4 . • 7 | 1.2.3.9.20 


A.l.lili.mol variations may be effected 
by adding (1) to any single figure, 
or by removing it from any double 
one ; excepting figures 10 and 20, 


11.12.13.4.20 | 11.12.13.4.17 | 11.12.13.9.20 | 




1.2.3.4.16.17 | 1.2. 3.4. 15.8.9 . 10 | 1.2 .3. 4. 17. 8. 9.10 | 1.2.3.4.5.10.7 




20 | 11.12.13.4.5 


.2.3.4.0.17 | 11.12.3.4.6 | 11.12.3.4.5.0.7 | 11 . 12 . 3 . 4 . . 7 [ 11 . 12 . 3 . 4 . 5 . 11 


11. 12. 13. 4.5. 6. 7|11.12. 13. 4. 6. 7|11. 12. 13. 4. 5.1 


| 11.12.13.4.10 


11.12.8.4.10 | 11.12.3.4.7 | 11.12.3.9.10 | 11.12.3.4.5.7 | 11.12.3.4.6.8.9.10 








11.12.13.4.7.8.9.10 | 11.12.13.14.5 | 11.12.13.14.5.6 


.7 | 11.12.13 14.6.7 




which, however, are interchange- 


11. 12.13.14.5.10. | 11.12.13.14.10 | 11.12.13.14.7 | 11.12.1.3.19 


10 | 11.12.13.14.16.7 




able with each other. 


11.12 1 1.14. 5.5.9.10 | 11.12.13.14.7.S.9.10 | 11.12.13.14.15.6.7 | 11.12.13.14.0.7 








5.5.11.15 | 1.2.3.1 1.1 "..10.1 i | 1.2.3. 14. 10.17 | 1.2.3.1 1.15.5.. | 1.2.3.1 I.2U | 1.2.3. H.I 7 | 1.2.0. 13.20 | 1.2.3.14.15.17 | 1.2.3.1 4. 15. 19.2.. , 1 .2.3. 11 . 1 7. 1 S. 1 9.20 | 1 2.3. 1.15 | 1.2.5.1.15 |r .17 [ 1.5. 3 1.1 17 | 1.5,5.1.15.5 


." 5.1. 2.. | 1.5. 51. 15.15, |9.5.l | 1,2.3,1.17.15.19.29 | 1.12. 511.5 | 1,12.311.5.10.7 | 1.15.5,14.0.17 | 1 .1 5.5. 14.5.50 | 1.12.3.14.10 | 1. 


2.3.14.7 | 1.12.3.19.10 | 1.12.3.14.5.17 | 1.12.3.14.5.18.9.20 


| 1.12.3.14.7.18.9.20 


11.2.15.4.15 j 11.2.15.1.15.0.17 | 1 1 .2. 13.4. J 0.7 | 11.2.13.4.15.10 | 11.2.13.4.20 | 11. 




13.4.5 | 11.12.3.4.15 


55 5 1.5.5.7 5.19,19 j ...55.5 , 5.7.1' |1.2 1l 5.0. | 7. -.3. In | 1.5. . 1 , 5. 1 .5 7. ,.9. 1 


1 1.2.5. U 5.5.7.5 9.HJ | 1,2.5.1 1.5.0.7.3,9.10 | 1.2.13.4. 


.0.7.8.9.10 | 1.12.3.4.5.6.7.8.9.10 | 11.2.3.4.5.6.7.8.9.10 | 11.12.13.14.15.16.17.18.9.20 










15,13.1 1.5.5.7.3.3.1.. 1 11.15.15.11 1 5.0.7.3.9. 10 | 1 


.12.13.11.15 10.7.5,9,19 | 11,12.13,11.15.15,17.5,9.1.. | 11.12.13.14.15 10.17.13.9.10 






1.2.3.4.5.6.7 8.19.20 








.14.15.10.17.18.19.20 












13.14.15.10.17 8.9.10 




11.12.13.14.15.16.17.8.9.10 | 1.2.3.4.5.16.17.18.19.20 | 11 
17.1S.9.IO 1 1.2.3.l4.1.-,.10.7.S.n 10 1 1.2.3.4.5.0.7.8 9.20 1 1 


2.3.4.5.0.17.18.19.20 




1.5.5.1.5.7.5,9.1.1 | 1.5.5.4. 7. s.9.10 , 1.5.3.1.7 | 1.5.5.9.7 | 4.5.5.9.10 [ I) 5.3.4.0.7.8.9. 10 | 9.2..3.4.0.10 | 9.2.3.4.C.7 | 9.5.3.4.0.10 1 9. 


.3.4.0.7 | 1.5.3.9.10 | 9.5.3.4.7.8.9.10 | 9.2.3.4.5.10 | 9.2.3.9.5.0.10 | 9.2 3.9.5.6.7 






5.5 1.7 | 11.5.5 9,7 1 11.2.3.9.10 | 19.5.3.4.6.7.8.9.10 | 19.2.3.4.6.10 | 19.2.3.4.6.7 










.15.3.4 7.8.0.10 | 1.15.3.4.7 | 1.15.3.9.7 | 4.12.3.9.10 1 9.15 ;. 1.5.7.5.9. 1 9 | 9. 1 J 
















1.5. 13.. 1.0.7 | 9.5.15, | ii.l.l | 9.5. i5. 1.0.7 j 1.5.15 9.10 | 9.5. 1 5. 1 . 7.59,1. 1 | 9.2.13.1.5.10 | 9.2.13.9.5.0.10 | 9,3. 1 5.9.5.0. 7 1 9.5.15 1.5.0.IO | 




8.9.5.10 | 1.5.13.4.10 


1 „. .3.1 I.5.7.S 9,10 | 1, 5. 511.7.5 9.1.) [ 1.5.3.14.7 | 1.5.3.19.7 | 4.2.3.19.10 | 9.5.3.14 0.7.S.9.10 | 9.2.3.14. CIO | 9 3. 511.5.7 1 9.5.5.11.0.10 ] 9 5.5.14.0.7 | 1.5.5.19.10 | 3.5.5.14.7.8.9.10 | 9.2.3.14 


6.10 ] 9.2.3.19.5 6.10 


9.2.3.4.10.10 | 9.5.3.4.10.7 | 1.5.3.9.20 | 9.5.3.1.17.8.9.10 | 9,5. 51.15.10 | 9 2.5.9. 1 5.0. Hi j 9.55.9 15 0.7 | 9 55. 1. 15.0.10 | 4.2.3.4.15 
11.15.3.4.7.8.0.10 1 11.15.5.1.7 | 11.1 ,. 1.9.7 | 1 1.15. 59.IO ] 19.15.3.4.0.7.8.9.10 | 19.12.3.4.0.10 | 19.12.3.4.6.7 | 19.15.3.4.0.10 | 19.15.3.4.0.7 





Each figure in the Diagram represents that word which stands under it in the Primary Sentences ; and each little set of figures constitutes a complete sentence, evolved 
us n variation from the twenty words. 

The remainder of the Evolutions would fill fifty more Diagrams of the same dimensions as this. 

A Mctubolical Apparatus, for presenting to the ove in irregular succession all the Evolutions of 84 words, in sentences of 21 words in length, and always excluding 63 
from sight, will be found described at the end u' this work. ° 



224 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



words required in other languages to express 
the same ideas, will convince foreigners that the 
constructions in English are distinguished for their 
simplicity. In this point of view the mere study 
of the two sentences will be instructive and encou- 
raging ; but the whole theory on which this 
system is based, namely the incapacity of the 
memory to perform more than a fraction of the 
work usually imposed upon it in this pursuit, may 
be fully tested within the same limits. If dif- 
ferent individuals co-operating to make a syste- 
matic experiment, would subdivide the sentences 
into shorter couples, they might also ascertain the 
power of retention which they severally possess. 
In such a contest the criterion would be their com- 
parative promptitude in translating the inter- 
changes with the same fluency which they display 
in speaking their mother tongue; for it is the 
combination of promptitude with fluency that 
constitutes the "mastery" of all the evolutions 
of the 20 words. 

The figures here represented will suggest to 
those who take pleasure in such computations, the 
attempt to discover what sort of sentences in their 
own language will, when coupled, yield the greatest 
number of variations ; how the syntax of their own, 
or any other language, can be exemplified in the 
smallest space ; what are the most comprehensively 
useful forms of colloquial speech for foreigners to 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



225 



commit to memory ; how many words of a foreign 
tongue are acquired by a child, week by week, 
when associating with other children of four, six, 
eight, or ten years old ; and how many words are 
actually employed by adults, who have gone abroad 
totally unacquainted with the language, and have 
resided among foreigners for any period from two 
months to two years. The latter points can be- 
hest determined by writing down the sentences 
which they utter, extending to not less than eight 
words in length. With the aid of a shorthand 
writer, such experiments could be made very 
rapidly. 

If an Englishman procures translations of the 
two sentences into a foreign tongue, in order to 
" master " them, he will find that their evolutions 
being fewer, will come into a much more manage- 
able compass than the diagram presents. 

The fact that educated men employ only 4,000 
words, has been left lying idle for a long time. 
The only useful purpose to which it can be applied, 
is to adopt it as the limit for a vocabulary for the 
learners of foreign tongues, in order to keep them 
within reasonable restraint. The first vocabulary 
ranges from 100 to 300 words; the second may con- 
tain about 700 more, and the third should comprise 
3,000 more. A book of selections from the best 
dramatic authors, limited to the said 4,000 words, 
would be a very useful production. No man 

Q 



226 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



requires more words in a foreign tongue than he 
actually employs in speaking his own ; and the 
more carefully he excludes all others, the sooner 
will he " master " the four thousand. 

In that vast preparation which goes on to 
instruct pupils how to use an unlimited number of 
unknown words with grammatical propriety, the 
difficulty with regard to genders occupies a promi- 
nent place. For instance, a vague notion prevails 
that it is possible by efforts of intellect to deter- 
mine whether a German noun requires der, die, 
or das. 

There is no part of a language in which the 
principle of limitation is more valuable than in 
relation to the genders. The supersession of the 
noun from its leading position harmonizes with 
this idea. The study of a German grammar creates 
gigantic difficulties. The articles generally come 
first in order, and as the definite one has four 
cases of three genders, there ought, according to 
the theory that the language is perfect, to be 
twenty-four different contingencies for which the 
article has to provide. But, as there is no diver- 
sity of genders in the plural number, there are 
only sixteen contingencies altogether, and only 
six forms to meet them all. Now the prac- 
tical knowledge of the articles apart from the 
nouns, is an abstrusity, which is supposed to be 
simplified by giving names to the contingencies. 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



227 



And so far as the reasoning faculty is concerned, 
the substitute suffices for those who are familiar 
with those terms, though not to others. But the 
practical knowledge can only be evinced by the 
application of the article, and it is therefore 
unattainable in the abstract. 

Conceding that the study of language is most 
philosophically conducted by investigating each 
part of speech independently, the simplest test of 
the accuracy of a man's knowledge of the article, 
would be to put a Greek book into the hands 
of the classical student, and to require him to give 
the German article corresponding to each of those 
which he found in the passage placed before 
him. In the case of a non- classical student, it 
should be an English book containing pencil 
marks, to show the genders, cases, and numbers. 
If he could comply with this requisition at the 
first sight of each word, his knowledge would be 
satisfactorily established. But as there are no 
adequate tests employed, it is assumed after a 
certain time, that his knowledge of the articles 
is sufficient. He then passes on through inde- 
pendent tribes of pronouns, till he arrives at the 
territory of the nouns. They are of three genders, 
and there are plenty of rules to explain them, 
but they are so encumbered with exceptions that 
they only produce disorder and confusion in the 
mind of the learner. 



228 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



It is an unfathomable mystery and a subject 
of endless consideration among zealous teachers, 
how to render the genders reasonably easy to 
beginners. The plan which they adopt, merely in 
default of a better, is avowedly wrong; but they 
never take counsel with the shepherd to find out 
how he happens to recognize each individual 
out of a thousand sheep at the first glance. 

If, according to grammatical theory, there are 
in German sixteen contingencies for the definite 
article, the smallest number of illustrations neces- 
sary for the exemplification of each of these would 
be three. Now sentences are the only possible 
illustrations, and therefore forty- eight sentences 
must be studied before the article can be clearly 
understood. The natural process therefore is the 
most strictly grammatical, because it gives the 
learner a knowledge of the genders and cases of 
a number of nouns, combined with the command 
of the definite article. But this is not the chief 
among the parts of speech. It is true, that without 
the article it is impossible to talk ; but it is also 
impossible to do so with the article alone. The 
fusion of all the parts of speech is their normal 
state; and the practical acquisition of a language 
ought not to be postponed until each of them has 
undergone a minute investigation. 

The condition of the article is one of servile 
dependence. He has no separate existence, and he 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



229 



is in a false position when treated as an inde- 
pendent member of the family. 

The theory that the study of the article in all 
its cases conduces to the development of the intel- 
lectual faculties, is not supported by the observa- 
tions of teachers. The elements in their separate 
state are too eihereal a food for the mind. It is 
not found in practice, that they call forth subtle 
speculations, either as to the nature of the unseen 
nouns in the background, or as to the various rea- 
sons which impel the Teuton to make so much 
parade of cases, and so many distinctions for the 
little word the, while some of those distinctions are 
devoid of differences, and some of the differences 
remain undistinguished. The various forms have 
to discharge inconsistent functions, one represent- 
ing both masculine and feminine; another both 
singular and plural ; one doing duty as nominative 
masculine, genitive feminine, and dative feminine 
in the singular, and genitive of all three genders 
in the plural ; besides officiating as a masculine 
relative pronoun. The best way of securing this 
Proteus is to seize him in all his different forms; 
to bind them fast together in one sentence, with a 
set of nouns containing no ambiguities as to their 
genders, and to commit it to memory. When he 
is thus fettered, the feeblest may overpower and 
" master" him. 

The " mastery " of the article necessarily 



230 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



involves a practical familiarity with all the cases of 
at least one noun of each gender in each declen- 
sion, and therefore it is a mere waste of time to 
attempt to learn the article by itself. A child 
delivers a sentence as if he had learned it by 
heart ; and so he does learn it, and in a manner 
much more perfect than that in which lessons are 
generally acquired. He has learned all the con- 
structions by chance ; he has learned the nouns with 
their articles sticking to them; he has added by 
chance to his primary sentences, others which have 
harmonized with them ; and the coupled sentences 
have been interwoven with each other, till the 
germs 'of millions of possible sentences are collected 
in his brain. As the well-worn silk stockings of 
Sir John maintained their identity through long 
years of continual worsted darnings, during which 
the original fabric was wholly superseded by the 
substitute, so the individuality of that original 
sentence which formed a basis for one which has 
just been uttered, though apparently merged and 
lost, is still there, and it is the same essence which 
has transmigrated into a new corporeal receptacle. 

It is a mistake either to analyse too far, 
or to generalize too far. We cut down sen- 
tences into words, syllables, and letters, to 
teach how they ought to be reconstructed; and 
we generalize about genders, in which each 
separate word must form the subject of a special 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



231 



acquisition. If several nouns having one termina- 
tion, have one form of the article generally attached 
to them, the feeblest understanding will draw the 
inference, and make the rule for itself, just as well 
as the grammarian. It will also make the exceptions 
in common words, in like manner, without any 
deliberation. The fact that a rustic uses some of 
them incorrectly, proves nothing more than that 
his parents and comrades did the same ; but if in 
nine cases out of ten he employs them correctly, 
that modicum of credit which is due to the natural 
process is either denied, or very grudgingly con- 
ceded, because it is held to be totally neutralized 
by the errors which are constantly recurring. 
Whether it may be possible to rectify that one- 
tenth of a rustic's phraseology, without putting him 
through a long course of technical grammar, may 
be determined by having respect to the fact, that 
in his mind habit has already superseded the neces- 
sity for learning the rules relating to nine -tenths 
of the grammar. It has been ascertained that even 
in the language of well-educated youths there is a 
large percentage of grammatical inaccuracy, which 
it is the crammer's vocation to eliminate ; and 
ultimately that there are very few, indeed, who 
attain to perfection. 

That standard of criticism which exacts 
perfection, and will not tolerate mediocrity, is 
too lofty for ordinary men. Perfection is an 



232 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



admirable standard, but it is only a discouragement 
when applied to beginners, because it is a goal far 
beyond their reach. In the scheme here advocated, 
however, there is great encouragement to the 
learner, because his goal is always within easy 
reach. The " mastery" of a sentence with all its 
variations is a clearly-defined termination to each 
separate effort; and so long as he continues to 
restrict himself to one at a time, his knowledge 
of the little that he has undertaken may be 
absolutely perfect. 

When a boy is sent to school at six or seven 
years of age to have his phraseology rectified after 
too much intercourse with servants, it is generally 
supposed that his study of grammar is the cause 
of his improvement. But the actual corrective is 
not to be found in the schoolroom, but in the play- 
ground, where the shafts of ridicule pointed to one 
error at a time, operate much more powerfully 
than the philosophy of grammar. So the illiterate 
may be gradually weaned from inaccurate forms of 
speech by dealing with them, one by one, in a 
systematic manner. When a man elevates himself 
in society by his own efforts, he reads hard and 
studies the best authors ; but in fact, the blemishes 
of his phraseology are only removed by a slow 
process of self-correction, not systematic, but yet of 
an analogous nature to that which has just been 
indicated. 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



233 



In a merely initiatory process, no design can 
be entertained either of assuming any pretensions 
to scholarship on the one hand, or of ignoring it on 
the other. A considerable command over the con- 
structions, cases, and tenses is attainable in an 
empirical manner ; and yet the knowledge is real 
and thorough. The empirical is generally con- 
demned as superficial; but when there are no pre- 
tensions to scholarship, there can be no reason for 
making deep diggings in quest of that which is so 
completely on the surface that any body can pick 
it up. 

Most of the current opinions regarding the 
learning of languages are evasive and dis- 
couraging, and they frequently give cover to some 
fallacy. Generally speaking, every one discoursing 
on the subject, begins by avowing that he is no 
linguist, and thus establishes a screen to protect 
himself. When called on to explain the right way 
of setting to work, the usual reply is, that we must 
first learn the names of a good many things, and 
then a few imperatives; but they do not venture 
to say how many nouns and verbs are wanted, nor 
can they specify the third step. 

Some say that we must think in a foreign 
language before we can speak it well ; but they do 
not explain how to begin that process of thinking 
in an unknown tongue. If they mean merely that 
those who think in it, speak it well ; and that those 



234 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



who speak it well, think in it, there is nothing 
puzzling or alarming in the proposition. But it is 
not by thinking in a language, but by not thinking in 
it, that children speak it idiomatically and fluently. 
A boy who has been reproved for some habitual 
inelegance of speech, generally resumes it in the 
playground; and if called to order, he replies, that 
he said it " without thinking." This is obviously 
a true and valid excuse. For that which has been 
learned by rote does not call for any thinking, in 
the elevated sense of the word ; and it is to save 
beginners from what looks like hard thinking, 
when they ought to be talking, that the plan of 
learning practical sentences by rote is advocated. 

Whether that very hard thinking, which after 
a long course of critical analysis, seems to be 
called forth, when the first attempts are made 
to compose sentences orally, can be considered a 
genuine intellectual effort, or only a severe struggle 
to think, let every man determine from his own 
experience. 

There is an impulse given by success, with 
which every one is familiar. That feeling often 
amounts to triumph, when the power of delivering 
complete sentences in a newly acquired language 
is suddenly attained. It is a triumph over the 
confusion of brain which ensues from attempting to 
think about too many things at once. To obviate 
that difficulty, we limit the number of the beginner's 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES, 



235 



considerations to a minimum. Success is the 
necessary result; and success communicates that 
stimulus which is so much wanted in this pursuit, 
to counteract the disappointments that await those 
who make precocious attempts to converse. 

Some say that it is useless to learn foreign 
tongues, because they are so soon forgotten. It is 
true that when utterly neglected they are gradually 
lost, but it is very easy to maintain them in full 
vigour by devoting a few minutes twice a week 
to oral composition in each language; and it 
is discreditable to lose an elegant accomplish- 
ment through a childish distaste, for so light 
a work. 

Some say that it is with words, as with birds. 
The larger the covey within ear or gunshot, the more 
they expect to bag by firing promiscuously into the 
thickest part. It is not good sportsmanship; but 
as it seems to save trouble, as it requires no discri- 
mination, nor even intelligence, and as many good 
performers commenced in that way, the simple 
process of listening is very popular, and it is gene- 
rally considered to be sound and effective. But 
unfortunately even when the learner makes a suc- 
cessful shot he does not take the trouble to secure 
the game. He would rather be seen with an empty 
game-bag, than with three little birds as the result 
of a whole day's sport; and his arithmetical lore 
does not suggest to him that the results of three 



236 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



months' acquisitions, even on that small scale, 
would form a very respectable stock of words. 

To wait passively for the formation of a habit 
which is essentially active, betrays rather a defi- 
ciency than a superabundance of sagacity. But 
the subject has been rendered so obscure by the 
general acceptance of crude unexamined notions, 
that there are few who endeavour either to reason 
out the causes of their own failure, or to overcome 
that abject helplessness and incapacity for self- 
instruction, which are engendered by unsound 
methods of teaching. 

The powers of attention and of retention are 
never equal in any two persons, nor are the results 
ever precisely equal for two days in succession 
in the same person. To work at about half power 
is the only way to ensure regularity of progress. 
We know that doubling the steam power will not 
make a proportionate addition to the speed of a 
ship, and we may learn something from that fact 
in regard to the exercise of the memory. The 
latter is admitted to be a leaky vessel, a cask 
from which the wine is constantly escaping. In 
the instance of a child, the useless words are 
always running out, because he does not employ 
any but the commonest ; but with adults the 
case is reversed, because they neglect the common 
to grasp at new ones. They are also influenced 
by their caprice, to relinquish words or forms 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



237 



of speech which are not to their taste; forgetting 
that what are called the obliquities, delinquencies, 
and deformities of a language, are the very things 
to which they ought to attend most. They are the 
points of divergence and contrast which constitute 
the characteristics of the language, and without 
which a foreigner cannot speak it well. 

The habit of speaking a foreign tongue is not 
the result of continuous study. All our training, 
however, tends to produce the impression that as 
nothing great is attainable without hard labour, 
so this small accomplishment exacts severe study. 
The second-hand performance of learning ready- 
made combinations is thought unworthy of a 
scholar. The only exception is made in favour of 
the most unpractical portion of a language- 
poetry. In an educational course, the exercise of 
the understanding is the prominent consideration, 
and the critical study of language does call forth 
severe intellectual exertion. Hence arises very 
naturally the inference that this attainment, which 
little children make light of, is very difficult, and 
thence springs that universal repugnance, which 
extends even to a small experiment with twenty 
words of an outlandish tongue. 

The commencement of a language is always 
repulsive and alarming; but if it is ever to 
be spoken, it is impossible to escape from the 
initiation. Here it is presented in a smaller 



238 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



compass than in any grammar or manual, and the 
power of expression resulting from the thorough 
knowledge of one hundred words is shown to 
transcend all the highest flights of imagination. 
The contemplation of the first plunge into a 
river on a cold morning may be disagreeable; 
but no improvement in the temperature can be 
effected by standing shivering in the keen East 
wind, nor is it of any use to move to the right or 
left to look for a warmer place. 

It would be tedious to recite the groundless 
objections, which, under an infinite variety of 
modifications, are arrayed in opposition to this 
pursuit. When driven from one hiding place, 
the objector takes refuge in others, from which 
it is mere waste of time to try to dislodge him. 

One of the greatest obstacles to colloquial 
progress is the dearth of imagination, and the 
want of method, both in teachers and pupils. 
They do not know what to talk about, nor in what 
manner to diversify their conversation without 
using unknown words. Every thing said is either 
too easy or too difficult, and there is no medium. - 
When the pupils try to converse with foreigners, 
they deviate still farther from the proper course; 
because strangers can have no idea of their 
vocabulary, nor of the extent of their knowledge. 
This defect can only be remedied by constantly 
shuffling the words, and translating the variations 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



239 



of the sentences which have been committed to 
memory. 

In our scholastic career, oratorical and logical 
diction forming the standard to which we are 
expected to aspire, our compositions are very 
properly judged with severity. But the same 
criteria are cruelly inappropriate when applied 
to the speaking of modern tongues, by people 
who, with all their best exertions, can never rise 
beyond mediocrity, either in thought, or in the 
mode of expressing it in their own language. The 
half-witted resolution never to attempt to talk the 
foreign tongue, until they can do it better than 
certain friends of theirs, is the illegitimate off- 
spring of that high standard. They are determined 
to reach the higher branches of the tree, without 
touching the stem or the lower branches. Child- 
ren use a ladder, which makes the ascent easy ; 
but the bystanders imagine that it is accomplished 
by the flights of a genius, which they are themselves 
conscious that they do not possess. 

Many refuse to deal with easy sentences, 
because no credit can accrue from them; and 
they prefer those which, being difficult, in- 
volve them in no reproach if they break down 
in the attempt to translate them. They are 
ashamed of being thought mere beginners ; and 
therefore they place themselves in an advanced 
position, which they cannot maintain, except by 



240 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



observing that golden silence, which far surpasses 
the silver of their speech. If, when called on to 
translate easy sentences, they resent the proposal 
as an insult to their understanding, and if they 
also refuse to practise in private, they can never 
succeed. With great labour, and admirable inge- 
nuity, they build a ship of surpassing magnitude ; 
but when she is completed, they find out that the 
noble structure is a great deal too large to be 
launched. 

We have not a word to say in depreciation of 
that extensive eye-knowledge of a living language, 
which many men, to their great mortification, dis- 
cover to be inoperative when they go abroad ; inas- 
much as they can neither understand, nor make 
themselves understood. But vieAving the colloquial 
as the grand desideratum, we regard as unreal and 
impractical all that cannot be readily reproduced. 
In plain terms, we treat it as unknown. The 
magnificence of the unknown has passed into a 
proverb. The practically known may be, in com- 
parison, as a mole-hill beside a mountain; but 
teachers labour indefatigably in adding to the 
mountain, while the mole-hill is completely over- 
looked. All the new acquisitions are carefully 
treasured up; and they are recollected when the 
familiar words are reproduced before the eyes 
in books. But the practical part is neglected, 
inasmuch as no set of words has been separated 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



241 



for daily employment in oral composition. The 
consequence is that to many who imagine them- 
selves to be in the right course, the labour appears 
to be aimless, endless, and hopeless. 

When the industrious student attempts to con- 
verse, his extensive knowledge of words is his 
first difficulty, and he deplores his inability to 
deploy them with readiness. But his accurate 
critical knowledge of the constructions is another 
obstacle ; because when he detects himself tripping 
in the formation of a sentence, his school habits 
prompt him to stop short, in a state of discomfiture. 
But the remedy is very simple ; for if he will lay 
aside his books, and exercise himself with a few 
coupled sentences, he must succeed. With all his 
large store of knowledge about the language, he 
has not made a beginning in the colloquial part ; 
but he may do so at any moment by " mastering " 
any sentence which he may please to select as 
the basis of his new undertaking. This fresh 
departure is the only effectual course for learners 
at every stage of advancement. The stream of 
their eloquence, although dammed up at first, will 
burst forth with vigour when the restrictions are 
removed; and the narrower the channel in which 
it is confined, the greater will be its impetuosity. 

We have shown that imitation is one of the 
sources of success. It was by practising imitative 
composition that Sir William Jones distinguished 

R 



242 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



himself as a linguist. Latin versification is imita- 
tive, and it tends to produce good scholarship. It 
is beneficial, because the beginner has before him 
the translations of perfect models; because his 
efforts are definite and limited; and because in 
each lesson a series of successes is gained under 
urgency. Oral exercises in prose on the same 
limited scale would soon lead to great facility in 
composition in any language. 

During a long course of study, it often happens 
that for several months at a time no progress is 
made. The teacher and the pupil are both con- 
scious of this very untoward fact; but they are 
unable to explain it, seeing that there is no abate- 
ment of zeal or attention on either side. They 
have unbounded confidence in the efficacy of 
parsing, and of rehearsing the same rules day by 
day ; and they have implicit faith in the virtue of 
turning over the leaves of a dictionary, and then 
guessing which is the right translation of a word. 
The failure is, therefore, quite unaccountable to both 
of them. But if oral composition were resorted to, 
there would be a lively exercitation of the memory, 
which, by revealing with precision the deficiency in 
the learner's practical knowledge of any one con- 
struction, would lead to a selection of sentences 
which, in one sitting, would supply that defect. 
In such exercises, none but very well known, 
familiar words should be introduced into the 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



243 



sentences at first ; and a dictionary should not be 
employed at all. The mischief done by the in- 
sertion of one or two unknown words in each 
sentence, outweighs all the benefit to be derived 
from the practice of oral translation. 

It is worthy of remark that teachers of lan- 
guages seldom select what is purely practical for 
a pupil to commit to memory ; nor do they limit 
him to learning so little, that he cannot help 
retaining every word. They feel a delicacy about 
marking off one portion of a lesson to be retained, 
because that would be equivalent to dooming the 
rest to oblivion. That result, they well know, 
is inevitable ; but they dare not formally recognize 
and grapple with the fact. The practice of re- 
capitulation is adopted, but not to much purpose; 
because too much has been undertaken each day; 
and therefore the exhumation and rehearsal of the 
words leads only to a galvanic resuscitation of 
them, as a preliminary to their being recommitted 
to the tomb. 

Some teachers recommend themselves to public 
notice by announcing that they do not require 
their pupils to learn anything by heart. They 
ask a boy's parents to reflect how much they 
themselves learned, and how little they have 
retained, of the passages committed to memory in 
early life. 

There are people who recite poetry in 



244 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



profusion, which they profess that they never com- 
mitted to memory. How the verses happen to be 
reproduced exactly in the author's words, they are 
not at liberty to explain ; but we are left to infer 
that it is the result of headwork, and not of the 
humble faculty of memory, much less of the 
despised practice of learning by rote. 

When there is pleasure taken in a task, it 
becomes stamped on the memory by frequent 
unconscious recitations. When little interest is 
taken in it, periodical repetition alone will enable 
the memory to retain it. But when the task is 
absolutely disagreeable, as is generally the case in 
learning a foreign language, very frequent repeti- 
tions become indispensable ; for without them our 
acquisitions can make no durable lodgment either 
in the head, or in the heart, or in the memory. 

In England, females are said to have a parti- 
cular aptitude for languages ; but men might pos~ 
sibly succeed equally well, if they heard French 
or German talked for hours every day, and if they 
were compelled to join in the conversation, instead 
of perpetually puzzling themselves with the ana- 
lysis of tough sentences. School girls speak more 
fluently and idiomatically than boys do, because 
their method is more practical. Not being sub- 
jected to the depressing, demoralizing influence, 
produced by being stopped short, whenever an 
inaccuracy or a difficulty occurs, girls display more 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



245 



self- possession, and less hesitation, in stringing 
words together. 

Moreover, needlework and other feminine pur- 
suits, are favourable to language-learning, because 
they leave the vocal organs at full liberty. Thus 
a party of foreign needlewomen might arrange to 
have useful sentences uttered for imitation and 
repetition every hour, without any serious impedi- 
ment either to their handiwork or their conver- 
sation. This is the principle already in operation 
in schools, where there is a perpetual recurrence 
of a set of questions and remarks, relating to 
the implements, the materials, or the ingenuities 
required in the various occupations in which 
the girls are engaged. But, as they are their 
own models, their pronunciation and phraseology 
are necessarily imperfect; and as the repetitions 
are not systematic, the sentences not being spoken 
exactly in the same words every time, the results 
are not so satisfactory as they ought to be. 

The mild Hindoo, whose education is generally 
as scanty as his wardrobe, exhibits great facility 
in picking up a language colloquially. He knows 
what sentences he will have to use as a traveller; 
he employs some one to tell him how to say them ; 
and he learns them by rote, one at a time. His 
wants are very few ; he uses his whole stock of 
words every day; and, by imperceptibly small 
additions, it increases. But as he learns it from 



246 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



those who speak inelegantly, as his knowledge is 
very limited, and as he has no idea of explaining 
the rationale of his plan, an Englishman scorns to 
adopt it. And yet the colloquial facility of the 
illiterate servant, at the end of each week's 
chatter, is, in many instances, greater than that 
of his educated master, at the end of each 
month's study. 

Blind people have also good success, because 
they do not impede their own progress by reading 
and writing; and they discern the difference 
between knowing words thoroughly, and knowing 
them by sight. 

The plan of bringing a foreign nurse into a 
family, in order that children may learn her lan- 
guage, is supposed to be perfect, because it is 
generally successful : but the process is almost 
always slow, and sometimes, from want of sym- 
pathy between her and the children, it fails 
altogether. But every child has an irresistible 
impulse to imitate other children ; for when sepa- 
rated from his own comrades, and thrown into 
the company of little foreigners, for three hours a 
day, he makes rapid progress in conversing with 
them. 

Why this law of nature has not been more 
generally adopted as the basis of action, by parents 
and missionaries, it is hard to say. The scheme 
works itself out to perfection in the torrid zone, 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



247 



where children who play with their little neigh- 
bours in the streets all day long, are often heard to 
speak three or four languages vernacularly. 

It is a mistake to suppose that one language 
comes more naturally to a child than another. 
Amongst the English residents in Bengal, there are 
many children who speak nothing but Hindustani. 
They do not even understand a word of English, 
because neither their parents nor their attendants 
employ it in speaking to them. In other parts of 
India, English children generally speak two, and 
sometimes three or four languages. This is also 
very common on the shores of the Mediterranean. 
Everything depends on their models, and a child 
who hears no language, will never learn to speak at 
all. If two or three infants were brought up in 
seclusion, attended by well-educated deaf and 
dumb nurses, they would imitate the sounds of 
birds and beasts, and would communicate with 
each other and with their nurses by signs and 
shouts ; but they would never be able to talk, 
except with their fingers. 

If two English boys, three or four years old, 
associated during play hours with two little 
foreigners, it seems probable that that language 
would obtain the ascendancy which pertained to 
the individual who, by strength of character, 
could exercise supremacy over the rest. Such 
experiments might easily be made in any large 



248 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



city, and it would be interesting to observe the 
results. 

When a missionary lands in a foreign country, 
with two or three children, he ignores the well- 
known fact that they are far more competent than 
he is, to teach the little savages English. If the 
latter were well scrubbed, and admitted, one at a 
time, to play with his children for three hours a 
day, they would talk in a few months, or perhaps 
weeks, as fluently and copiously as their white 
playmates. Moreover, the language would be 
genuine English, not the gibberish usually spoken 
by foreigners. Five or six children, of different 
ages, might thus learn to speak in the first twelve 
months, and the number might easily be doubled 
in each succeeding year. 

Nothing but the injudicious interference of the 
white man could arrest the success of this plan. 
The white children should be prevented from 
learning the foreign tongue at first, because if 
they could converse in it they would cease from 
speaking English, and the scheme would utterly 
fail. Even at three years of age, children show 
this amount of discrimination; for they see, or 
feel, that the fitness of things requires that each 
person should be addressed in his own language. 

Care should be taken not to allow anybody to 
speak broken English in presence of any of the 
children of either race; because a few minutes 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



249 



spent in company with such a person would corrupt 
their language. 

By the adoption of these suggestions in a 
Mission, a great waste of time and temper might 
be spared; The white children would become the 
unconscious instruments of civilisation, by teaching 
their playmates to speak our language ; and, in 
after-life, they would be the fittest agents for pro- 
claiming the Gospel to the heathen, in the purity 
of the native tongue. 

There would spring up an English-speaking 
community, amongst whom every new missionary 
might be actively employed from the day of his 
arrival in the country, instead of devoting himself 
almost exclusively to study. At present many of 
the missionaries are not allowed to learn foreign 
languages in England. This fact is full of signifi- 
cance. But if there be any virtue in the child's 
process, the young men might learn the pronun- 
ciation from a native in England, and then they 
might employ their time very profitably during the 
voyage, in committing a stock of well-chosen texts 
to memory. By this means they would involun- 
tarily learn to express their thoughts with fluency 
in Biblical language, and to converse with the 
natives, within a very few days after their arrival 
at their destination. 

It does not seem to have been laid down that 
when men speaking uninfected languages approach 



250 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



the grammar of a highly inflected one, a greater 
degree of caution should be exercised than when 
the conditions are reversed. A German comes 
down hill to learn English, but it is a hard 
pull for an Englishman to ascend to German. A 
classical education is, no doubt, a good training in 
relation to the power of understanding inflections ; 
but the amount of intelligence required in this 
respect is very minute indeed. It also imparts 
thoughtfulness about each individual word to be 
uttered, but the said thoughtfulness is only an 
impediment to fluency of speech. A German can 
do himself no harm by seeing that my and Ms 
represent twelve words in his own dialect, but an 
Englishman is bewildered by seeing that there are 
six ways of translating each of those words into 
German. 

The paradigms of the two languages indicate 
their relative difficulty. When the system of begin- 
ning with sentences is adopted, the complications 
of the grammar, every one. of which is a novelty 
and a puzzle, are kept out of sight. On taking 
up the paradigm, beginners meet with the contents 
of perhaps a hundred pages of grammar closely 
condensed ; but they find on inspection that many 
of the items have been " mastered,'' and that the 
synopsis is not so intricate as it looks. They soon 
discover by analogy the relations of the known 
to the unknown words; and it is on this account 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



251 



that all explanations and technical terms have 
been excluded from the paradigms. 

If scientific principles are to be employed in 
teaching, with a view to the attainment of rapid 
progress, all that is irregular and exceptional in a 
language ought to be excluded, until that which is 
regular has been " mastered." There ought to be 
no laws laid down for the learner, except such as 
are to be inflexibly observed ; and those which are 
liable to be constantly broken ought not to be 
mixed up with them. Exceptions may prove rules 
theoretically, but in practice they disprove them. 

In order to qualify a traveller to undertake 
new languages in an independent manner, it is 
desirable that he should invent or adopt some 
phonetic system, and become perfectly familiar in 
practice with its minutest details. But even when it 
is thoroughly known, it will be of no use in respect 
to an unfamiliar tone or sound. It is only after 
the pronunciation has been acquired, that any 
writing can be useful.- Phonetic practice is an 
excellent discipline for those whose handwriting is 
illegible ; but to undertake it at the same time with 
the commencement of a new language is to aggra- 
vate the difficulties of both. In the first instance 
it ought to be applied to a foreign language which 
the learner can pronounce well, and then to his 
own ; for this experience will lead him to an appre- 
ciation of its exact value, in regard to the utterance 



252 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



of sounds which he has not previously learned to 
pronounce. 

It is generally considered very easy to make 
acquaintance with a language, so far as to under- 
stand what people say. This, however, is merely 
inferential knowledge, inasmuch as it depends 
largely on the observation exercised upon the 
matter in which the foreigners may be engaged, 
the tones of their voices, and the expression of 
their faces. But as a positive knowledge is often 
acquired in that manner by mere habituation, 
without the use of books, it stands to reason that 
great benefit may be derived from having passages 
read aloud to us, in which it has been previously 
ascertained that the words are all common and the 
sentences short and simple. To have the same 
sentences daily read very rapidly by a foreigner, 
with a few additions to them, would necessarily 
lead to perfect familiarity with them in a short 
time, without laying any burden on the memory. 
Every addition being fully explained beforehand, 
the exercise would be much easier than that of 
listening to desultory conversations; while it 
would also be a valuable aid to that general 
familiarization with the sounds of the spoken 
language which, to some people, is very difficult 
of attainment. 

This exercise may be despised, as too easy. It 
certainly does not call for any intellectual vigour, 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



253 



but its simplicity forms its strongest recommenda- 
tion ; for graduated exercises might be made, 
which would soon lead to a rapid apprehension of 
all ordinary passages in books. By parity of rea- 
soning, the same process ought to be introduced 
into the study of Latin. Some passage being 
thoroughly explained, studied, analyzed, and under- 
stood, the pupil might reasonably be expected, 
without the aid of his eyes, to give the English 
translation. At first, one short sentence would be 
sufficient for a very tender beginner ; but whatever 
stage of progress he may have reached there should 
be special care taken that it should not cost him 
any effort. It might be carried on separately, and 
independently of the ordinary work, and as the 
time occupied would be extremely short, there 
would be no hardship in it. The knowledge of 
the constructions thus acquired, would enable the 
pupil more readily to understand his ordinary 
lessons ; and the test of its soundness would be the 
daily introduction into each sentence, of some one 
alien word, borrowed from another quarter, but 
well known to the pupil. 

The strictly imitative character of this method 
is such, that a foreigner might be furnished 
with nothing but Shakspearian sentences, purely 
comical, or highly tragical, according to the 
humour of his preceptor. The reproduction of 
these in the ordinary transactions of life, would 



254 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



produce very exhilarating effects. So Plato and 
Xenophon would afford charming conversational 
Greek, for two men assisting one another in oral 
composition. For graver work, apart from the 
colloquial branch, the " mastery " of a chapter of 
the Old Testament in Hebrew would enable a man, 
in testing this scheme by himself, to rub off the 
rust that may have accumulated upon his early 
acquisitions; but the grammars of that language 
are not to be touched by beginners. The syntax 
is a series of anomalies and discords, and the 
paradigms are appalling, when approached without 
due preparation. 

In changing from one language to another in 
colloquial exercises, it is advisable to rehearse one 
or two sentences of the new one, in order to banish 
that which has just been used. When a beginner 
is learning two languages at once, he may chance 
to intermingle them unless he takes this pre- 
caution. But it is better to learn one at a time ; 
for the results thus obtained will be greater, and 
there will be less chance of confusion. 

The object of this work has been to show how 
the first approaches to a new language ought to be 
conducted, so as to avert the disappointment and 
mortification which are often experienced when 
men fail, after devoting themselves earnestly, and 
bestowing a great deal of valuable time on the 
attainment. The different degree of talent which 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



255 



people possess forms a subject of much talk, but not 
of much thought. The remark is generally made, 
in self-justification, that no two men have the same 
turn for this pursuit. By referring it to a special 
faculty or taste, it is gently removed beyond the 
pale of discussion. But no man can be said to 
have tested his own powers if, after overwhelming 
his memory with a crushing load, he has succumbed. 
Unless he does common justice to himself, without 
instituting any comparison with others, his expe- 
rience under such circumstances is worth nothing. 
It has no bearing on the subject at all. The pre- 
dominance of chance in the progress of children, 
learning foreign languages, has been noticed; and 
the law of numbers, applied to words, shows how 
half a dozen short colloquial sentences, accidentally 
picked up, may form the foundation for a rapidly 
acquired familiarity with even a difficult language. 
But it is not easy to say what constitutes difficulty 
in a language, seeing that the feeblest intellect is 
amply sufficient for the work. The inability to 
communicate with precision the manner in which 
any individual has " mastered" a language, in a 
short time, with very little exertion, is universally 
acknowledged. It is said that no two minds can 
go through the same identical process; and hence 
the opinions and the skill of the most accomplished 
teachers are often set at nought. After all, a lan- 
guage, when acquired by a thousand men in a 



256 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



thousand different ways, is the same, and their 
inability to retrace their path through the wilder- 
ness is very remarkable. It shows the absence of 
methodical procedure, or a deviation from it, of 
which they cannot be unconscious. 

There is the same want of method in the opera- 
tions of those who, when thrown amongst savages, 
have contrived to learn a little of their language, 
but so little that when they recount their adven- 
tures, they shrink from any attempt to give a 
detailed account of the manner in which, and the 
rate at which they acquired it. How to act under 
such circumstances is a problem which may be 
solved without much difficulty by men of some 
experience as linguists. It is not necessary to 
traverse oceans and continents to find barbarians 
to practise upon. Every foreigner landing on our 
shores with his family, if altogether ignorant of 
our language, is as much a barbarian to us, as we 
are to him. The most ready way of learning 
some sentences would be to fraternise with his 
children ; to offer them attractive gifts ; to note 
down their utterances; and to imitate, repeat, and 
verify them, in a series of small experiments. It 
would not be so easy to deal with old, taciturn, 
sensible savages, who could see the uselessness of 
dealing out words to a white-faced stranger, whose 
presence had no tendency to inspire them with 
garrulity. But even with them the process ought 



MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



257 



to be conducted on the same principle ; and they 
should be conciliated and rendered communicative 
by pleasant surprises. The names of things might 
of course be quickly extracted from them, but 
very little good would result from learning even a 
large number of bare words. 

When learned men are consulted as to what 
they consider the most important point for a 
beginner, they are fond of giving Hamlet's oracular 
reply, " Words, Words, Words." In advising a 
young architect, it would be equally rational to 
say " Bricks, Bricks, Bricks." Hamlet had some 
method in his madness, but there is a melancholy 
negation of method here. The natural course is 
to learn the most useful sentences, and assiduously 
to interchange new words with them. For a 
beginner, therefore, the true motto is " Action, 
Action, Action." 



s 



NOTE. 



YX7HILE this work has been going through the press, a 
* * machine of singularly ingenious construction has been 
invented and patented, by an enthusiastic admirer of the 
system which it describes. Adopting the theory of the 
quasi-mechanical nature of the operation by which idio- 
matic sentences, when learned by rote, germinate and 
expand into a whole language, and being experimentally 
convinced of its truth by his personal application of it to 
ancient Greek, Mr Long has devised an apparatus which, 
when turned on its axis, exhibits an endless succession of 
the variations of four sentences of twenty-one words each. 
It consists of a box eighteen inches in length and six in 
depth, having three rows of windows in front, each of 
which faces a little chamber, wherein cubes are placed 
which rotate whenever the box is turned. Each cube has 
a word written on each of its four sides, and by means 
of a device for producing irregularity in their rotations, a 
fresh combination of twenty-one words appears at the little 
windows after each revolution of the box. The cubes are 
removable at pleasure, and the learner may write upon 
them whatever words he may select, due consideration 
being made, as provided for in Pages 50 and 51, for pre- 
venting any deviation from idiom, grammar, or sense. 



260 



NOTE. 



The application of colours, as suggested in Page 132, 
to the English nouns or verbs, so as to indicate to the 
learner the declensions and conjugations to which they 
severally belong, is effected by the insertion of ground 
glass on the facets of the cubes, and the use of coloured 
chalks to write upon them. 

The sentences may be reduced to any length. If they 
are of seven words each, so as to occupy only one row of 
windows, the number of combinations of that length will 
be 4 7 , or 16,384. If they fill two rows, there will be 4 14 , 
or 268,000,000 combinations of fourteen words each. If the 
three rows are filled up, 4 2 . 1 , or 4,000,000,000,000 of com- 
binations of twenty-one words each will result. It is not 
intended that the beginner shall go through all these 
evolutions, because it would require more than 100,000 
years to do so. 

The impartiality of this apparatus in giving sentences 
to be translated into Greek, is equal to that of a first-class 
Examiner. 

In its property of excluding from before the eyes all 
those words that are not wanted at the moment, there is a 
remarkable coincidence with the theory enounced on that 
subject. Nature shows that they ought to be so banished 
from sight. 

That dearth of imagination and method in teachers and 
pupils, which is deplored in Page 238, is remedied by this 
contrivance, because it shuffles the whole of the known 
words, and it is impossible that any unknown word can 
intrude to disturb or confuse the learner. While it thus 
performs the functions of an exercise-book of unimaginable 
dimensions, it affords graduated lessons, exactly to the 



NOTE. 



261 



number required in each individual instance, at any stage 
of progress. 

The machine represents the brainbox of a person who 
has learned exactly 84 words of a foreign language, and 
has neither seen nor heard one word more. It secures limi- 
tation, exclusion, interchanging, repetition, and imitation. 
That instantaneous production of the words in gramma- 
tical and idiomatic sequence, which constitutes " mastery," 
is also personated. The machine is therefore an interest- 
ing embodiment and exemplification in walnut- wood of the 
whole system. 

But it has other virtues also ; for problems in arith- 
metic may be introduced into it, so as to lead learners 
gently on from numeration to the stiffest questions in the 
Rule of Three. The art of Short-hand writing is commu- 
nicable thereby ; and there are many educational purposes, 
which it will subserve in a more agreeable manner than 
the generality of merely mechanical performers. Let it 
not be supposed that it supplies brains or information. 
Its vocation as an instrument of education will be to 
receive into its mystic chambers that lesson which the 
pupil first of all commits to memory, with its variations. 
The lesson may be very short, and the items few in number, 
but by slow degrees they increase. And as little by little 
is added to them, that amalgamation of them, which is the 
great object of teaching, is effected by requiring the pupil 
to reproduce the previously imparted knowledge, to apply 
the principles thereof, and to " master " one thing before 
he undertakes another. 

But there is another remarkable purpose to which Mr 
Long has adapted this machine. The metabolical presen- 
tation of words, suggested to his inventive faculty the idea 



262 



NOTE. 



of producing musical combinations on similar principles. 
The provision whereby grammar and idiom are preserved 
intact, throughout that inconceivable number of sentences, 
being so applied to bars of music, that the time and key- 
are in the first instance secured, the revolutions of the 
machine produce Eolian measures, in the same multitu- 
dinous variety. This analogy appears again in Page 116, 
where the interchangeable rudiments of a sentence are 
manifestly the bars in the music of speech. 

This beautifully simple apparatus shows that much of 
what is called the intellectual, is subject to mechanical 
laws ; whilst it also elucidates one of the many occult 
harmonies in creation. 



THE END. 



lb S > 



PR1NTKD BY C. W. REYNELL, LITTLK PL'I.TKKEY STREET, HAYMARKEI, 



